Joy of assisting newborn Olive Ridley turtles safely into the sea


After making it to Arribada, the annual mass nesting and egg laying ritual of Olive Ridley sea turtles, I was keenly following the events around the marine turtles. As the mass nesting was over, I was curious to know about the hatchling time, when the baby turtles tumble out from eggs laid deep in the sands. It takes around 45 days after the mother turtle lays the eggs inside the pits in the sand.
The hope of making it to this spectacle brightened when a former colleague, whose hubby is a wildlife professional, asked me whether I should be part of the team of volunteers  going to help out the baby turtles reach the open sea safely. I immediately registered as a volunteer in the limited member team finalized for this trip.


While getting confirmation about my participation, I was informed that attending a nearly two hour orientation programme is a pre-requisite for volunteering to this unique rescue mission. Given the skeptic within me, as I entered the hall where the orientation session was to be conducted on a Saturday evening I was wondering what sort of orientation it would be. 

For the first time I heard about Emergency Relief Network-IFAW-Wildlife Trust of India initiative for which we were to work as volunteers along with a few wildlife professionals and young veterinarians on the mission to rescue baby Olive Ridley turtles and guide them into the sea saving from the numerous predators. After a brief introductory session along with a brief Do's and Don'ts during the mission, we were shown a video on how endangered the Olive Ridley sea turtles have become due to human negligence. The video showcased previous rescue mission, which was of great help to understand the fine line between an environment or wildlife enthusiast and a volunteer for a wildlife rescue mission.  

Though a bus was arranged to transport nearly 40 odd volunteers, vets and professionals, me and my eldest brother opted to travel the 150 odd km distance by our own vehicle as we had to visit, after the rescue mission, the coastal town of Gopalpur for a glimpse of the 2nd edition of Public Art event PAGO. The post-midnight journey from Bhubaneswar was a smooth ride on National Highway 16, with couple of tea breaks in between, and we reached the first assembling point that connects the highway through a narrow road to Gokharkuda, the sea beach near the Rusikulya river mouth, where our rescue mission was to materialize.  After a while the bus load of team members joined us and we were guided to the nearby forest check post, a few kilometers away from the Gokharkuda beach where we had to park our vehicles and started walking. 
It was still quite dark. Some of us, who were seeing the tiny turtles for the first time, couldn’t resist collecting and putting them in the buckets given to us though we were still quite a distance away from the shore. Pat came an instruction from the facilitators to stop flashing torches and mobile phones to collect the baby turtles, as any form of light distracts turtles towards the light source instead of the sea shore. 

This made all of us settle down there on the sand to experience the thrill of baby turtles passing alongside our body. 

 As soon as the darkness faded, the volunteers were divided into teams of four to five members each including one vet with minor surgical equipment to set free those baby turtles entangled in plastic nets or webs of grass creepers. Every team member carried one bucket to carefully pick up the baby turtles rescued far from the shore and were asked to proceed towards the shore. 
 


As our team started, we found several of them struggling to overcome the hurdles of grass creepers, jumping into the small water bodies presuming it to be the sea and many entangled in the nets wherein the vets had to intervene and carefully free them.
 

With the half a bucket of baby turtles, I started walking towards the shore picking the stranded ones on my way. The bucket was full as I reached the shore walking one and half kilometres through the guarded zone with iron barricades providing safety from predators like dogs indicating that baby turtles can safely walk into the sea after this point. One of the wildlife protectors measured the weight of the bucket filled with chirping baby turtles before I unloaded it on the wet shore frequented by sea waves. 

It was a true delight seeing the hundreds of baby Olive Ridley making their way running, rolling and jumping into the sea. The joyful satisfaction added another bout of energy and motivation to walk back to far off sands and repeat the exercise of picking up the stranded ones and helping them reach the sea. 

With progression of time, arrived the scorching sun rays and the need to travel farther, miles away from the shore, to rescue the tiny beauties from the increasing heat and predating animals. As we were told, the scorching sun ray makes it almost impossible for the baby turtles to cover the distance and reach the shore. 
As I moved farther from the sea into the thorny sand dunes and bushy areas, though it’s really tiresome, I was utterly surprised and shocked to see more and more baby turtles struggling to make their way. While hundreds had lost their lives being attacked by ants, many more had fallen prey to predators like kites, crows, crabs etc. 

The predator & the prey .. Photo @ Krushna's
Photo @ Krushna's
Few more buckets of rescued turtle babies, dropping them off safely to the sea, I could feel the exhaustion from inside. But the water bottles were emptied by then. As same was the case with other volunteers as well, we all started moving towards the base camp. The team of 45 odd volunteers involved in the mission that lasted for a few hours in the morning could rescue over 50,000 baby Olive Ridley sea turtles and safely released them into the sea. 

Photo @ Krushna's
During my final rescue round before returning to the base camp, I saw a couple of baby turtles coming out of sand, which was already hot. I went to rescue them before signing off the day’s mission. But it was not two! While three more were trying to come out, many were still inside. 
Photo @ Krushna's
 I immediately gave a shout to attract other volunteers, who were on their way back to the base camp, to help me bring out those turtle babies who otherwise had almost no chance of surviving the hot sun and hot sand for miles upto the shore unless picked by someone. As three boys turned up and we started collecting the baby turtles one by one; they were 43 in number! The contentment doubled as I released them into the Bay of Bengal.
Photo @ Krushna's

Photo @ Krushna's
Photo @ Krushna's
I was probably the last person, damp tired and exasperated, approaching the base camp. But the satisfaction was so immense that, given opportunity, I would love becoming part of such a mission every year.
Photo@ Krushna's

Photo@ Krushna's
Photo@ Krushna's
Location: Rushikulya River, Odisha

Comments

  1. Parimita RoutrayAugust 3, 2018 at 10:44 PM

    Wow again a nice piece written on redleys hatchlings rescue. I remember rescuing many hatchlings from the sand dunes area

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Krushna MahapatraAugust 4, 2018 at 11:16 AM

      Thank you Madam .. I remember you going miles far into the sand dunes to rescue the hatchlings .. great spirit ..

      Delete

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