Wild Ceylon Journal

A Tale about a Sea Turtle

Ravi Corea – September 27, 2011



Loggerhead Turtle - Caretta caretta gigas

Tuesday, September 27^th dawned as usual and for all intentions and purposes was going to be another regular day.  That was until the call came.  I was working on the laptop and planning the day ahead with my driver, Sampath when the phone on the table started to ring.  The time was 8.05 am.  On the third ring I answered, “Hello?”

It was a man’s voice. “Good morning - is this the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society?”

“Good morning—yes this is the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society,” I replied. “How can I help you?”

“I want to let you know that when I was coming in the train to Kolpetty to work today I saw a kesbawa on the beach at Galle Face”

I could not help but repeat what I heard, “A kesbawa on the beach?” “You saw a sea turtle on the beach at Galle Face?”

“Yes on the beach right in front of the old parliament – and the crows were pecking on it.”

“Then it must be a dead turtle,” I said.

“Not when I saw it,” the voice replied. “It was moving – it was still alive.”

“The crows know better—they eat the dead all the time” I responded. 

“I’m pretty sure it was alive when I saw it,” the voice replied.

“If it was on the beach at Galle Face how can you see a kesbawa from the train? There are no railway tracks along Galle Face?” I pointed out. “Did you actually see it?”

“Actually I didn’t see it - a colleague of mine had seen it when he got off the bus at Galle Face,” the voice replied apologetically.

“Is your colleague absolutely sure that he saw a turtle and that it was alive?”

“Of course he saw a turtle and he is absolutely sure that the turtle was alive at least when he saw it at the time.”

“I appreciate the fact that you thought of calling us – but the people you should really inform about this is the Department of Wildlife Conservation or NARA,” I told the voice. “They are the government institutions that are responsible for attending to such matters.”

“We tried too - but couldn’t get through to anyone of them,’ the voice replied. “Do you think you can do something for this unfortunate animal?”

“I’ll see what I can do. I need to verify first whether the turtle is dead or alive.”

“Thank you! It was definitely alive when my colleague saw it.”

“Well – I’ll see what can be done,” I replied and we hanged up.

Turning to Sampath who was standing by the door all this time I said, “We have to make a slight change of plans.”

“What has happened? Has a kesbawa got into parliament?” he asked.

“No, a kesbawa has not got into parliament—probably its’ trying—it is on the beach in front of the old parliament.”

“Oh – okay - are we going to check on it? He asked.

“I guess we have too.” I said getting up from my chair to go get dressed to check up on this turtle.  

It was around 9.00 am by the time we got on to the Marine Drive.  Soon past Bambalapitya railway station the traffic thinned out and we were soon at Colpetty Station Road to get back on the Galle Road.  As we sped along Galle Road I was pondering about the turtle.  If crows were seen pecking at it I was pretty sure the turtle was dead.  But then there was also the off chance likelihood that it could be alive!  Then what? Since both the Department of Wildlife and NARA (which stands for National Aquatic Resource Agency) have not been contactable - what should I… or what could I do?

Then I suddenly got an idea.  A good friend of mine was a Director in the Ministry of Defense (MOD) which was located at Galle Face.  Being an avid wildlife enthusiast I knew I can get his support in case the turtle was alive to come up with some arrangement for its rescue.  So I contacted him.

“Hello – JM – Guess what? I’m on my way to Galle Face – your neck of the woods so to speak to check up on a sea turtle that some party has seen up on the beach there.”  Due to the loud wind noise it seems he did not hear me correctly the first time.

“Hello Ravi – what did you say was happening on the beach at Galle Face?” “Isn’t it a bit too early in the day for a beach party?”

“I’m coming to check up on a sea turtle that is supposed to be on the beach – not for a beach party.”

“You are coming to check on a sea turtle! Where?” JM responded excitedly.  

It is supposed to be right opposite the old parliament on the beach,”

“Are you already there?” he asked.

“No – but I will be there in 5 minutes.” I said.

OK then I will meet you there” JM replied.

“Great – see you soon” and we hanged up.

There was barely any traffic on Galle Road or people on the promenade when we got near to the old parliament.  I was looking to see if there were people gathered along the sea front knowing how a sea turtle on the beach would attract a throng of people.  Surprisingly there was no such throng.  I gestured to Sampath to slow down and to cruise along the sidewalk of the promenade so that I could find someone to ask about the turtle.  Two Muslim men in brilliant white sarongs and lace fez hats on their heads were looking at the beach below and talking animatedly.  They seem like ideal candidates to ask the where about of the illusive turtle. So we stopped by them and I asked whether they knew about the turtle and they said, they had just arrived there and had no idea about a turtle.  Then I spotted a police officer standing a bit further away who was looking at our vehicle.  As we got close to him I asked, “Ralahamy (officer) did you happen to know about a kesbawa that was on the beach?

He walked up to the car and asked in a soft hushed tone, “Who are you?

I said, “I got a telephone call saying that there was a kesbawa on the beach opposite the old parliament.”

He asked, “where you from?”

“I am from the Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society I got a call about this sea turtle that is why I’m here.” 

“Why are you here?” He wanted to know.

“I just told you – I got a call about a kesbawa on the beach opposite the old parliament.”

He said, “Can I see you Identity Card?”

“Of course – but I came because I got a call about a sea turtle.  That is why I’m here and what has my ID got to do with a turtle on the beach?”

It seems even though I was repeatedly telling him why I was there it was not registering in his mind. 
After staring at me sadly and pondering over what I had said for what seems interminable number of minutes, he said suddenly, “I was asked by the Navy to check the ID of any person who inquired about the kesbawa.” 

“You are checking the ID of people who inquire about the kesbawa!” I asked incredulously—thinking there could be possibly how many people in Sri Lanka in total—who had the habit of going around the country checking up on kesbawas!? Most curiously why would the Navy be so interested in this activity?    

 

I pulled out my national identity card and gave it to him.  He asked whether I had an institutional ID card. I pulled out my SLWCS ID and gave it to him.  I was expecting him to ask next for my birth certificate!

Satisfied that my credentials qualified me to inquire about kesbawas on the beach he asked me to get down and come with him.  As we were walking he said the Navy had asked him to expect me since they had called me and informed about the turtle but to check my ID first before showing the turtle.  He pointed out to where a Navy soldier with an automatic rifle was standing by one of the mounted cannons along the sea front and said the turtle was there.

The Navy was guarding the kesbawa!  Must be a pretty important sea turtle if the Navy thought it needed to be guarded.

I was a bit concerned when the cop said that the Navy was expecting me and had claimed they had called me since I did not receive a call from the Navy, or at least the caller who informed me about the turtle did not reveal that he was calling from the Navy.  Anyway there I was now escorted by a police officer heading to check on a sea turtle that had a Navy guard! 

The policeman introduced me to the Navy guard who promptly called his superior officer on his cell phone.

Standing at the edge of the promenade I’m wondering what I have got myself into!  Can it be that this sea turtle is some secret defense experiment gone awry!  The way they were acting it was as if one of the teenage mutant ninja turtles had shown up dead on the beach at Galle Face!   From where I am standing I can see the turtle.  The Navy patrolmen who had found it on the beach had put it into a pit they had dug in the sand and left it half covered presumably for me to examine it.  It was definitely not a washed up ninja turtle.  Looking at its overall appearance from the promenade I’m pretty sure that it is a female loggerhead turtle known scientifically as Caretta caretta gigas and unfortunately it looked pretty dead.



From the Promenade I could see it was a dead female loggerhead turtle

The Navy guard thrust his phone at me saying that his immediate superior office wanted to speak to me.  The officer informed me that they were waiting for me to examine the turtle and tell them what to do with it.  He wanted to know whether they could bury it. I said what they should do is inform NARA as soon as possible and ask them to attend to this matter immediately.  He said they had tried to contact NARA but had not been successful and whether I could do it.  I said I’ll try.  As I finished speaking to him my friend from the Ministry of Defense came in a convoy of trucks with several civilian and military officers.  The place began to look like some high flung military op than an effort to check up on a sea-turtle that had turned up dead on the beach.

The place began to look as if a high security military operation was underway



Sampath and I jumped down from the promenade to the beach below and went to check on the turtle.  The defense personnel standing along the edge of the promenade was attracting the interest of passing motorists who were probably wondering what was imperiling our national security on that Tuesday morning.   



JM arrived in a convoy of trucks and defense personnel



Explaining to JM about the status of the sea turtle and about turtle ecology

Closer inspection verified my initial identification of it being a female loggerhead turtle.  It had been dead for at least 2-3 days.  I confirmed to JM that the turtle was dead—in fact it had been dead for some time so there was no need to call the coast guard or the Navy to provide a boat to release it back to the sea.  He wanted to know what should be done now that it was confirmed dead.  I asked him to contact NARA and inform them about it.  After a short time talking about turtles and reminding again to call NARA without fail I took leave of my friend and his colleagues.  It was with a sigh of relief that I leaned back on the seat to contemplate on the fact that everything has gone smoothly and I have not been arrested for violating any national security act in regard to sea turtles—when it suddenly struck me that I had completely forgotten to check the sea turtle for any tags.  What with having to deal with all the security issues and having to give explanations as to why I was interested about a dead sea-turtle, I had completely forgotten to check whether it had been tagged.  We were already at Union Place. I asked Sampath to turn around and we rushed back to the place the turtle was.  On the way we made a quick stop to get a piece of soap knowing that we had ahead the dirty business of messing around with a deceased and decaying chelonian.

Only the police officer who initially checked my ID was there.  He was happy to see us and was friendlier too.  The Navy guard had left.  I told the police officer that we had forgotten to check for something very important and need to re-examine the turtle.  He said the Navy guards had put the turtle back into the pit and covered it well before they left.  He came with us to the place the turtle was and I saw with dismay that the Navy had well and truly covered up the turtle.  Jumping down again Sampath and I went to where the turtle was buried and started to dig the sand with our hands and a stick we found nearby. Within minutes we had it unearthed and pulled it out of the pit to check whether it had been tagged.  I checked all its flippers including the edge of the carapace (the shell) but there were no metal or plastic tags on the turtle.  The carcass was in a pretty advanced state of decomposition and was draining body fluids from various orifices and the stench was awful.  No wonder NARA was reluctant to show up - they of course knew better!



Digging the turtle out the second time around to check for taggs



The daunting task of tigging a half rotten sea turtle out in the morning - no wonder NARA was determined not to show up. 



Turning the turtle around to check for taggs in the back flippers and plastron



Not a job that you get people lining up to volunteer their help



Both front flippers were not tagged...

...neither were the back flippers, carapace or the plastron

The turtle was in an advanced state of decomposition, the smell was very bad!

After I finished examining the turtle we put it back in the pit and covered it with sand.  We then put some wooden poles lying nearby across the top of the pit to help identify where the turtle was, just in case NARA showed up to inspect the animal.

According to what we know of sea turtle ecology and behavior the current understanding is that sea turtles show an incredible fidelity to the beaches where they hatched from.  Mature females supposedly return to their natal beaches and lay clutches of over one hundred eggs multiple times during the breeding season.  Many of these nests are raided by predators and poachers.  The SLWCS conducted one of the first sea turtle surveys in the east coast from 2008 to 2009.  During those surveys we found out that practically 100% of the sea turtle nests in the east coast were destroyed by predators and poachers.  Wild boar, Bengal monitors and feral dogs were the most common predators with wild boar consuming most of the eggs.  We found out during our research that predators and poachers were in direct competition for the nests.  To address this issue the SLWCS trained a local community-based environmental organization in Panama to conduct beach patrols, identify sea turtle species and to install in-situ nest protecting devices to safeguard whatever intact nests they found.  Just these few simple but effective measures resulted in over 1000 baby turtles hatching out (considering there was none before) and getting a shot at surviving and becoming adults who would one day hopefully make it back to their natal beach.         

The hoards of hatchlings that emerge from nests that have survived again have to face a gauntlet of predators as they too make their way to the open sea.  This time it is crows, crabs, oceanic birds and predatory fish.   The day old hatchlings that survive this onslaught and other challenges they might face in the open sea years later as mature adult females come to the same beach were they hatched to lay their eggs.  It is still not clear how they do this.  It is possible that this loggerhead female was heading to its natal beach when it met with whatever misfortune that resulted in its death.  Since generally sea turtles are long lived and supposed to live over 50 years it could be possible that this female hatched out from the beach at Galle Face or somewhere along the Colombo coastline that many years ago.  Just to imagine that it was possible at one time to stand at the edge of the promenade or along the beach in Colombo and observe gravid female sea turtles ponderously hauling themselves on to the beach to lay eggs and then weeks later to observe the hoards of hatchlings heading out to sea would have been incredible sights to observe.  What a spectacle it must have been—today our lives have become poorer for destroying such natural events which are considered premium wildlife attractions and generates vast amounts of tourism revenue in other parts of the world.

JM’s efforts to contact NARA through his official channels turned out to be a complete fiasco.  Even at the highest official level when they were informed about the turtle it seemed NARA was incapable of taking any action.  This in turn led to some serious logging of complaints at the highest ministerial level protesting about the ineffectiveness of NARA officials to respond to a matter such as this in an efficient and timely manner.

I had no part in these discourses and communications but heard about them only later.  But there was an interesting aftermath probably as a result of these complaints against NARA.  I began to receive numerous calls that day from a female officer at NARA in regard to the turtle.  During one of these calls she informed me that they were at the site but could not find the carcass.  I explained to her where it was and how they could find it.  She called back to let me know that they had found the site but could not find the turtle.  I asked her to check more thoroughly since the turtle was buried in the sand.   A little while later she called to inform me that they had found the turtle and taken some samples, and now the Chairman of NARA, wanted them to bring the carcass back with them.  I agreed that it would be good for them to take the carcass back with them and preserve the skeleton and the complete shell for future reference and make a record of the location where it was found.  Then she very politely asked me whether it would be okay with me if they took the sea turtle back with them to NARA.  For a moment I was not sure of what I had heard.  I was sort of flabbergasted.  Recovering from my initial surprise I asked her to repeat it again.  She asked me again, “Mr.Corea would it be ok with you if we took the sea turtle with us to our office at NARA.”  I said, of course by all means it was perfectly fine with me for them to take the sea turtle with them and I’m sure the turtle wouldn’t mind it either!  As the call ended I could not help but wonder what would have happened instead of a sea turtle it was a massive whale that got beached or even that very remote chance, what if it was a teenage mutant ninja turtle!?

Unfortunately it was not a Mutant Teenage Ninja Turtle!