What we do with the sea turtles

After dinner, we sit around at some picnic tables under a little roof with some stairs leading up to the main part of the lodge. At about 7:00 pm, tourists from nearby hotels come to watch the sea turtles. They do not help the sea turtles, they just watch them. After they come, we sit around and read or play cards or catch fireflies.

Once the tourists leave, we are free to go help the sea turtles. There are about 2 or 3 patrols who go out. Once a patrol finds a sea turtle track (it is very easily noticeable because it is very dark against the black sand) we go up to where it messed around and turned. If the turtle is still there, then one of us reaches under the sea turtle to catch the eggs as they fall and then put them in a plastic bag. We have to have red film on our flashlights because the regular light confuses the turtles.


If the sea turtle has already left though, we poke around in the sand with a stick to find a place where the stick goes through a lot farther than it does regularly -- in other words a hollow place down in the sand.

Once we find that, we dig in that spot until we start getting to some white things that look like golf balls but are a lot squishier. We put on a white rubber glove and take out all the eggs, because it's safer that way and they are a little sticky. Once they are all out and in the bag, we fill in the hole. Then we go to find a safe place to bury them without the turtle tracks. We do this instead of putting them in the hatchery, because it is better for them to be buried in their natural environment. Also, the poachers normally look where there are tracks, and once we've buried them we fill it in, smooth out the sand, and put little sticks on it to make it look like the rest of the beach. We also make sure that our footprints don't show.

Sometimes we find a nest that the crabs have found. They think that turtle eggs are delicious treats.

Sometimes a turtle comes up and doesn't feel safe in that area so it doesn't lay any eggs, but turns around and goes back to the ocean. It is quite annoying when they do this and have us poking all around with sticks and not find anything. When it does this, it is called a "rayo."