Sea Turtle Recovery Action Plan for Barbados - WIDECAST
Sea Turtle Recovery Action Plan for Barbados - WIDECAST
Sea Turtle Recovery Action Plan for Barbados - WIDECAST
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<strong>Barbados</strong> <strong>Sea</strong> <strong>Turtle</strong>s …<br />
ments that the protection of regionally depleted species, including sea turtles, is a priority.<br />
<strong>Barbados</strong> played an important role in the adoption of the new SPAW Protocol and its Annexes,<br />
having attended both the January 1990 and June 1991 Conferences, but Government has not yet<br />
ratified the Protocol. It is the recommendation of this <strong>Recovery</strong> <strong>Action</strong> <strong>Plan</strong> that <strong>Barbados</strong> ratify<br />
the SPAW Protocol with its Annexes at the earliest possible opportunity.<br />
4.33 Subregional sea turtle management<br />
To establish whether nearby countries share with <strong>Barbados</strong> a common stock of sea<br />
turtles, especially hawksbill and green turtles, will require a cooperative ef<strong>for</strong>t amongst nations<br />
to tag juvenile and adult turtles. The extensive travels of adult green turtles are especially well<br />
known in the Wider Caribbean, in part because of many years of tagging at a large nesting<br />
colony in Tortuguero, Costa Rica (e.g., Carr et al., 1978; Meylan, 1982). It is also known that<br />
juvenile green turtles move from one "developmental habitat" to another, and may travel<br />
thousands of kilometres during the decade(s) of adolescence. Thus it is clear that no one nation<br />
can effectively manage or conserve green sea turtles. Green turtles, especially adults, are<br />
comparatively rare in <strong>Barbados</strong>. Nesting has never been documented.<br />
Less is known of the movements of hawksbills, but long-distance tag returns are reported<br />
from the Wider Caribbean. For example, Nietschmann (1981) reported hawksbills tagged in<br />
Nicaragua and recaptured in Jamaica and Panama. Carr and Stancyk (1975) reported hawksbills<br />
tagged in Costa Rica and recaptured in the Miskito Cays of Nicaragua. On 20 July 1990, a<br />
juvenile hawksbill (74 cm SCL) tagged six months be<strong>for</strong>e at the Biological Reserve of Atol das<br />
Rocas in Brazil, was captured and killed in Dakar, Senegal. The distance traveled was at least<br />
2,300 miles (Marcovaldi and Filippini, 1991). Relatively recent tagging projects implemented in<br />
Antigua, the U. S. Virgin Islands, and Caribbean Mexico will undoubtedly provide additional<br />
data in the future, as, hopefully, will tag returns from turtles tagged here in <strong>Barbados</strong>.<br />
A joint hawksbill tagging programme involving at least <strong>Barbados</strong>, St. Lucia, St. Vincent<br />
and the Grenadines, and Grenada would contribute greatly to our understanding of the stock<br />
structure of hawksbills in the Wider Caribbean, and strengthen conservation ef<strong>for</strong>ts in the area.<br />
<strong>WIDECAST</strong> promotes such cooperative, international approaches to sea turtle conservation, and<br />
would offer technical support to such a project. Cooperative tagging projects are a priority in<br />
Appendix I, "Expansion of the <strong>Sea</strong> <strong>Turtle</strong> Project in <strong>Barbados</strong>". It is also the recommendation of<br />
this <strong>Recovery</strong> <strong>Action</strong> <strong>Plan</strong> that <strong>Barbados</strong> participate in regional ef<strong>for</strong>ts to define sea turtle stocks<br />
using mtDNA or other proven genetic analysis techniques.<br />
With regard to the few seasonally occurring leatherbacks, it is certain that they travel<br />
widely amongst nations. There are several records of leatherbacks tagged on Caribbean beaches<br />
found later in New England (e.g., Pritchard, 1973, 1976; Lambie, 1983; Boulon et al., 1988), and<br />
studies of the rate and composition of barnacle colonization on Caribbean-nesting females<br />
corroborate the notion that these turtles embark from temperate latitudes on their way to tropical<br />
nesting beaches (Eckert and Eckert, 1988). Gravid individuals can be expected to return to<br />
<strong>Barbados</strong> at intervals of 2-5 years to repeat the nesting procedure, and in the process will pass<br />
through the waters of many nations. <strong>Barbados</strong> cannot protect its leatherbacks without the<br />
support of all Caribbean nations.<br />
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