Since Sea Turtles are Endangered, Why Can’t We Just Help Ensure the Majority of Hatchlings make it into Water Instead of 1 in 1,000?
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We do. In areas that are common sea turtle hatcheries, different organizations go to great lengths to both protect the sea turtle nests and to help the hatchlings themselves.
Obviously sometimes best hatch earlier than expected, or in the middle of the night when no one is around, so no one knows and no one is there to protect them. This also happens on remote beaches that humans just don’t go to.
But you can see plenty of videos on the internet of sea turtle hatchlings making their way to the water with crowds of people watching and volunteers guiding them.
We do! While we can’t just pick them up and yeet them into the ocean, preservation societies mark off nests, set patrols, make sure they are at the right depth and temperatures, and try to be there for the actual hatch to scare off predators.
As for why we can’t just yeet them, the dash they make for the ocean both helps them get a hang of moving their limbs so they don’t drown, and makes sure they understand how to get back to those nesting grounds to lay their own eggs.
There’s a misunderstanding in your question. 1 in 1000 hatchlings survive to adulthood, but most hatchlings make it into the ocean. Once there they are easy pickings.
Went on a vacation to mexico 15 years ago and one night the staff had people on the beach and were handing out baby turtles to release on the beach. Naturally I took part, as did a lot of kids.. guess what happened when the tide came in and hit the kids feet 10 seconds later.. they screamed and laughed and started running in the direction and stomping where they just let the turtles go. Wouldn’t be surprised if a few didn’t make it past 30 seconds because of those kids.
[An issue that is part of a much wider problem is that the sex of a sea turtle is determined by the temperature the egg incubates at. Cool temps and they’re all make, warm temps and they’re all female, with a mixed transition zone.](https://www.deseret.com/u-s-world/2022/8/4/23292012/why-arent-florida-sea-turtles-males-females-heat-temperature-sex-ratio-skewed-species-extinction?_amp=true)
Anyway – you may have heard in the news something about global temperatures rising in recent years. Well, they’ve risen enough that almost all sea turtles born are female. Something like 1% of sea turtles are male now, down from about 50% of hatchlings in the early 1990s, with some hatching areas seeing no males at all.
Despite the best efforts of the remaining males the population as a whole is getting to a crisis level for being able to reproduce.
We do that already. It’s a huge event at some places too. Unfortunately they still need to survive once they’re in the water. We track the mothers to know where they’re laying clutches and then their nest gets fenced off and watched after
I was camping out on a beach once and when I woke up I saw some tracks next to my tent. I followed them to a Kemps Ridley sea turtle, the most endangered species. I got ahold of the national seashore and they sent a team of volunteers to dig out the eggs. I kept traffic away from the nesting mother and the volunteers took the eggs to the national seashore to hatch where they were protected from vehicles and predatory wildlife. Sometimes sea turtles are lucky like this and sometimes no one is around to see where they laid their eggs and nature happens.
It’s not just about making it to the water. It’s living long enough to get big enough not to be a meal for birds and fish.
Most do actually make it into the water. The majority just don’t make it past that, as they get eaten by any number of animals. Getting rid of the predators isn’t an option because that disrupts the food web, so all we can do is keep nesting sites as protected as we can so at least the majority of the hatchlings are safe on land.
Serving to reach the water isn’t the issue, that’s how it is in nature the issue is the pollution, destruction of habitat, lose of food supplies, being killed via discarding netting etc
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