THE "ARRIBADA"

image credit @Ashika

One can never imagine the secrets hidden by nature underwater. Deep-sea divers, marine experts are few among the luckiest to unravel the ascetic value of the oceans to us. The oceans of the world sustain millions of species from tiny algae to the largest mammal ‘the blue whale’. One such species which is found in the tropical regions of the oceans has its presence over 100 million years! Believed to live more than fifty years, it swims across the ocean thousands of miles with its four flipper legs and bears a protective shield (top shell) called carapace all along in its entire journey. They have olive coloured body parts and thus named as ‘The Olive Ridley’ turtles.

Olive Ridley turtles are the second smallest next to the Kemp Ridley’s and the most abundant of all sea turtles found in the world. The females are larger than males. They prey on jellyfish, crustaceans and snails. The olive ridley is listed as vulnerable under the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). They are known for their unique mass nesting offshore in most parts of the earth. The major nesting grounds of olive ridleys include the coast of Mexico, Costa Rica and the East coast of India. Gahirmatha beach in Kendrapara district in Odisha is the largest nesting grounds of Olive Ridley turtles in the world. Other nesting grounds in India are Rushikulya river mouth in Odisha, Vishakapatnam coast in Andhra, Point Calimere coast in Tamil Nadu, Marina, Eliot and Besant Nagar beaches in Chennai.

One of the most fascinating facts of the olive ridley is that the female migrates thousands of miles to hatch eggs offshore on the same beach where it first hatched! This nature of nesting of the turtle in the exact place of its hatching has made scientists jaw struck over the years and has provoked them to know the method in which it tracks its way back home. There are many theories like they use the earth’s magnetic field and navigate following the ocean currents. But none has been proven scientifically and their method of navigation remains a mystery!

The Olive Ridley turtle plays a major role in the ocean ecosystem, they maintain the seagrass beds and coral reefs on which other marine organisms develop their habitat. If this species of turtle goes extinct even commercial fishing Industry will slump down as the marine ecosystem is dependent on healthy seagrass beds and coral reefs.

Turtle conservation programs have gained importance in this anthropogenic era due to its steady decline of the population all over the world. The olive ridley turtles are exploited for meat, eggs and leather. They are accidentally caught by fishing gears which mostly leads to death. The eggs are prone to threat, where the dogs and jackals dug deep the conical nest of the sand and eat up a significant number of eggs. Such accidents can be completely avoided through various methods of conservation, one such conservation which has a good effect on the declining population of olive ridleys is ‘The Turtle Walk.’

TURTLE WALK

Sea turtle conservation in India had started with turtle walks in the then Madras and Orissa in the early 1970s. In India, the olive ridley turtles come up with nesting on the beach at night, between Januarys to April every year. The nesting is mostly a nocturnal event. The forest department along with volunteers gather at the site late night and take a walk along the coast to collect the eggs from the sand nest. This process may hinder dogs from damaging the eggs. The collection process is carried out until around 4 am the next morning. Such a process of collecting eggs is carried out by volunteers and conservationists each day alternatively. The collected eggs are safeguarded, grouped and then carried safely to the hatcheries, where they are maintained in different temperatures. The temperature of the eggs affects the sex in a turtle. Temperature beyond 30-degree Celcius produces female and less produce a male. This is called temperature-dependent sex determination. The eggs incubate around 50 – 60 days. After the emergence, they release the hatchling safely into the sea. This process saves thousands of eggs each year from being damaged in a single site.

Plastic menace and the Ridley’s 

About 12 million plastic wastes are dumped into the ocean every year. The plastic which is an alien in the marine ecosystem alters the feeding habits of the marine species. The olive Ridley turtles mistakenly eat the dumped plastic wastes in the ocean. Since plastic is inorganic it gets deposited in the intestine of the turtle and leads to death. One in twenty Olive Ridley turtles which come offshore to lay eggs die consuming plastic waste produced by the incoming tourists. Our negligence and unaccountability in disposing of the trash cause an overall negative impact which ends the life of an astounding species.

For those who have successfully scrolled down the page you deserve to know what ‘Arribada’ means. The process where a large group of female Olive Ridleys gather offshore and come onto the beach to nest all at once every year is called Arribada. Kemp Ridley turtles are the only turtles other than Olive Ridleys to undergo Arribada!

Other facts:

• In a single nesting season, females lay between two and six clutches of eggs, each containing 65 to 180 eggs.
• The olive Ridley turtle is a schedule 1 species protected under the Indian Wildlife Protection Act 1972.
• The Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute at Cochin together with state forest department foresees major threats and conservation strategies.
• International institutes for the conservation of marine species including turtles are Oceana, Blue Frontier Campaign, Live Ocean et cetera.

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