Sea TurtlesPolicies, Perceptions & Precautions

An Analysis

The Foundation for the

Conservation of

Natural Resources

© 2003 All Rights Reserved. International Foundation for the Conservation of Natural Resources

Sea TurtlesPolicies, Perceptions & Precautions

The Language of Sea Turtle Policy

The language and literature of sea turtle policy are confusing at virtually every level starting with the basic question of how many species of marine turtles are swimming about the world’s Oceans. Europeans recognize eight (EuroTurtle) while the United States only acknowledge seven.(FWS) The odd turtle out (or “in” depending upon one’s venue) is the Black sea turtle (Chelonia agassizii) considered by Americans to be a subspecies of the Green marine turtle. (Parham, Zug 1996)

At scientific and academic levels internationallyrespected scientists disagree with each other with camps ofscientists rallying behind certain points of view.Scholarly studies and government reports offer contradictoryinformation with some government agencies tenderingstatements about sea turtle species that appear to be indirect opposition to information about the same speciespublished by a sister agency charged with identical speciesconservation duties.

A prime example is the United States Fish & WildlifeService (F&WS) of the U.S. Department of the Interior and

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the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) under the U.S.Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and AtmosphericAdministration (NOAA). The two share responsibilities overwildlife species such as marine turtles that fall into the“protected” category. The NMFS/NOAA species profile forleatherback turtles states “Historically, leatherbacks wererarely taken for their meat” but concedes that “a few havebeen killed in recent years.” (NMFS) Whereas the U.S. F&WSfact sheet on leatherbacks asserts that “the crash of thePacific leatherback population, once the world’s largestpopulation, is believed primarily to be the result ofexploitation by humans for the eggs and meat, as well asincidental take in numerous commercial fisheries of thePacific.” (F&WS)

Similarly, terminology and statistics are tossed aboutlike a garden salad until their meanings are all but lost.The two most misused terms associated with marine turtlescholarship are “threatened” and “endangered.”

The inherent danger of too much chaos on so importantan environmental and biological issue as the health andwelfare of marine turtles is that confusion masquerading asfacts stifles knowledge, misleads students, sendsscholarship down blind alleys, and provides an unstablefoundation for crafting public policy dealing with theturtles, their habitat and co-inhabitants within their eco-systems including humans.

Sea turtle policy does not live in a vacuum. It hasdirect bearing on cultural activities and commercialventures including diet, recreational activities, commercialfisheries, real estate development, energy exploration,military equipment and weapons testing, and more. If suchpolicy is founded on faulty premises, it cannot help butbecome faulty policy, benefiting neither the turtles noranyone or anything sharing their surroundings.

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The Perceived Status of MarineTurtles

All marine turtles are on some organization’s orgovernment’s “threatened” and “endangered” list. Eachspecies within the Cheloniidae and Dermochelyidae Familiesis listed on Appendix I of the Convention on InternationalTrade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).CITES’ Appendix I “lists species that are the most endangered amongCITES-listed animals and plants … These are threatened with extinction.”(CITES) Each is also listed under the United States’Endangered Species Act (ESA).

Within the ESA, a marine turtle species can be boththreatened and endangered, with the latter categoryengendering the most concern because it is perceived assignaling impending extinction. Of the six species ofmarine turtles that frequent U.S. waters, the Olive ridley(Lepidochelys oliveacea) and loggerhead (Caretta caretta) sea turtlesare considered threatened with the Olive ridley listed as“endangered” only in its Mexican nesting areas. TheLeatherback (Dermochelys coriacea), Kemp’s ridley (Lepidochelyskempii), hawksbill (Eretmochelys imbricate), and Green turtles(Chelonia mydas) are classified “endangered.” (NMFS)

Designations such as “threatened” and “endangered”attached to each species of marine turtle are a seriouscause for alarm; at least that would be a reasonableconclusion. Each suggests a perilous and tenuousrelationship between the marine turtle species in questionand their ultimate demise. It is reasonable therefore toexpect questions about what exactly is meant by each term.Here too, however, the fog of confusion begins to settle in

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after even a modest degree of researching availableliterature on the subject.

Criteria for either “threatened” or “endangered” statusappear fluid at best. For some species, the endangereddesignation seems based on a comparison of modern populationnumbers to a benchmark figure assigned to a specific date inhistory. For example, the majority of literature on theKemp’s ridley sea turtle references a home movie taken by anengineer named Andrés Herrera in 1947 purporting to show40,000 Kemp’s ridley females wading shore at Rancho Nuevo,Mexico to deposit their eggs. A similar phenomenon can beseen in the 1982 estimate of 115,000 leatherback femalesworldwide. Both are the premises upon which a great deal ofspeculation and scholarship are based. But, the questionthat begs an answer is, are these premises accurate?

In the early 1990’s when the Kemp’s ridley was themarine turtle in the popular spotlight as “most endangered,”the joint U.S. F&WS/NMFS Recovery Plan of 1992 for thatspecies cited 1978 nesting numbers at Rancho Nuevo at lessthan 200 turtles or one half of one percent of the baseline1947 population estimate. (F&WS/NMFS) Such a steep drop inKemp’s ridley numbers appeared a legitimate cause forextreme environmental alarm. Predictions that the littlesea turtle would be biologically extinct by “the turn of thecentury,” echoed throughout the popular press andscholarship of the day. (American University) Now threeyears beyond the date the Kemp’s ridley was supposed to bowout of existence, the species appears to be flourishing withnumbers of nests attributed to Rancho Nuevo thirty-fold the200 figure given for 1978.

Today’s concern is that the leatherback is “careeningtoward extinction” even though its global populationestimates are three to five times that of Kemp’s ridleyturtles. Like the Kemp’s ridley situation over a decadeago, that doomsday portrayal comes from a comparison of the

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1982 figure of 115,000 leatherbacks to a 1996 population re-estimate of 20,000 to 30,000 adult females suggesting apopulation drop of 78 percent. Combined with widespreadclaims that “probably fewer than 1500 females (are) nestingthroughout the Pacific Rim” the grim forecast for theleatherback has biologists, policy makers, journalists andthe public holding a candlelight vigil over the apparentlymoribund turtle. (SeaWeb) Again questions arise with thecentral one being, are we really on a death watch or willthe predicted end to leatherbacks suddenly prove as mythicalas that of the Kemp’s ridley?

A look beyond press accounts to the work of seriousscholars unaffiliated with advocacy group campaigns suggeststhe latter. Both the Kemp’s ridley and leatherbackbenchmark figures have been called into question by recentscholarship.

Dr. René Márquez of Mexico’s Instituto Nacional de laPesca and considered the dean of scholars dealing withKemp’s ridley turtles notes flaws in the estimationtechniques used to extract the figure of 40,000 nestingfemales from the 1947 movie frames. Márquez doesacknowledge that nesting congregations during the 1960seasily surpassed 2000 individual turtles. (Márquez 1994)Similarly, French Marine Biologist Marc Girondot andcolleagues discount the 115,000 figure put forth in 1982 as“largely overestimated.” In their proposed correction ofthe International Union for the Conservation of Nature andNatural Resources (IUCN) listing of the leatherback, theystate that an accurate estimate of the high numbers mark forleatherback turtles is simply unknown. (Girondot et al)

For other species of marine turtles, extant grossnumbers are too great to justify the “endangered” banner. Adifferent approach was devised to allow the “endangered”label to be associated with them. Rather than applying itto the entire species, geographically designated

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“populations” that appear to be waning in numbers are giventhe title.

The Olive ridley sea turtle may well be the specieswhose literature presents the most baffling of apparentcontradictions to even serious students of the species.Referenced by the F&WS fact sheet as being “widely regardedas the most abundant sea turtle in the world,” the Oliveridley is then said to have gone into “a decline ofabundance” since being listed under the U.S. EndangeredSpecies Act. The species received its “threatened” label in1978. As referenced earlier, differences between how theF&WS describes its marine turtle charges and how its sisteragency, NMFS, characterizes the same turtles can be worldsapart. In the case of the Olive ridley, the distinction isastounding.

In its fact sheet, the F&WS states the Olive ridley’s“breeding colony population on the Pacific coast of Mexico”is listed as “endangered.” NMFS says the endangered statusapplies to “the Mexican nesting population” of the species.The wording difference between the two agencies seems subtlebut it’s not. According to Dr. Grahame Webb, chairman ofthe IUCN Australia/New Zealand Sustainable Use SpecialistGroup, Olive ridley turtles “lay 2800 tonnes of eggsannually” on one Mexican beach, hardly the egg output for an“endangered” colony. (Webb)

What is equally startling to a student, curious reader,journalist or investigator seeking information for theformulation of public policy is how this species can beconsidered even “threatened” with biological extinction muchless be “endangered” when both agencies’ fact sheets statethat a single season at the Bhitarkanika Wildlife Sanctuaryat Gahirmatha, India sees as many as 398,000 Olive ridleyfemales crawl ashore to nest. (F&WS) That number,obviously, does not include Olive ridley males. To date, no

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one has figured a way of estimating the number of males ofany marine turtle species. They never return to land.

As stated in the opening premise of this analysis,unless terms are clearly understood and facts are asaccurate as possible, confusion sets in and precludes theformulation of sound management policies. The reality isthat any issue involving sea turtles, whether an individualspecies or collectively, is fraught with terminologydesigned to create perceptions and influence policy. Again,the Kemp’s ridley turtle demonstrates just how easily aphrase or term can mean any number of different and oftencontradictory things.

The term “Rancho Nuevo” demonstrates that point. The1990 NOAA/NMFS study on declining sea turtle species offersthe figure of 200 nesting Kemp’s ridley turtles for 1978.However, the records collected by the marine biologistsworking with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and Mexico’sInstituto de la Pesca on site at Rancho Nuevo list 924Kemp’s ridley nests for that year. Even at a rate of threenests per turtle per nesting season, the total nests usingthe NOAA/NMFS figure would be barely 600.

What accounts for the remaining 324 nests? The answeris that the use of the term “Rancho Nuevo” amonginternational scholars has become somewhat elastic. Insteadof referring to the research “camp” overseeing the singlestretch of beach associated with the town of Rancho Nuevo,many scholars today consider all seven research campsstretching the length of the two adjacent Gulf coastalstates of Tamaulipas and Veracruz as “Rancho Nuevo, hencethe seeming discrepancies in turtle and nest numbersassociated with Rancho Nuevo.” Since 1990 the trend inKemp’s ridley turtles finding their way back to the Mexicancoastline has increased steadily from 992 (1990) to 2080(1996) to 3845 (1998) to 6277 (2000). (Marquez, Burchfield)

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Sea Turtles & Advocacy Campaigns

An interesting pattern appears when public debate andpolicy regarding marine turtle species is viewed over time.The title of “most endangered” gets bestowed upon the marineturtle species most closely associated with the advocacycampaign of the moment waged by animal rights/environmentalnon-profit organizations against species-specific commercialfisheries.

The interest in fisheries, aquaculture and seafood bynon-profit environmental and animal rights advocacy groupsfrom Greenpeace to Earth Island Institute (EII) to theNatural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) to The HumaneSociety of the United States (HSUS) is neither a new norcasual relationship. It has always been a high priority forthe non-governmental organization (NGO) community and takenmany forms embracing a wide variety of marine creatures –both plants and animals – to gain public and press attentionand sympathy. Invariably, the more charismatic the marinelife featured as being endangered by whatever activity istargeted, the more successful the campaign.

The initial NGO foray against shrimp farming held upmangroves as the threatened species. That tree did notelicit feelings of sympathy through the public with the sameintensity as dolphins or sea lions. The decade-long“dolphin-safe tuna” crusade directed toward the EasternPacific yellowfin tuna fishery during the 1980’s proved one

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of the more successful NGO ventures. The Atlantic swordfishfeatured by the SeaWeb-sponsored “Give Swordfish a Break”campaign, proved more successful. SeaWeb, it should benoted, is one of the main sponsors of the currentLeatherback/swordfish campaign. A Pew Charitable Trustsprogram, SeaWeb released the first press notice of the AAASpanel announcing the campaign.

In the early 1990s, environmental advocacy groups ledby Earth Island Institute took credit for the government-initiated program of mandating Turtle Excluder Devices(TEDs) in shrimp trawl nets. The Kemp’s ridley sea turtlewas crowned the “Most Endangered” sea turtle for thatcampaign. Then little importance was paid to longlining andleatherbacks. In fact, the most comprehensive governmentstudy on sea turtles – “The Decline of the Sea Turtles:Causes and Prevention” by the National Research Council1990- stated that:

“Sea turtles are caught infrequently onlong lines in the gulf and Atlantic(Swordfish Management Plan 1985). On thebasis of data from the 1979 Japanese longline observer program, 12 turtles(including two leatherbacks) were caught inthe gulf and 17 (including nineloggerheads) were caught in the Atlantic.During 1980, the same observer programreported 10 turtles captured.” (NRC 1990)

The most sophisticated NGO-inspired campaign to date isthe current controversy over the alleged imminent extinctionof leatherback sea turtles due to the swordfish longlinefishery. Although the rhetoric of the campaign blaminglongline fishing for the deaths of 40,000 sea turtles a yearwas posted by the Sea Turtle Restoration Project a yearearlier, the effort did not take off until a new launch

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strategy was employed with scholars, not activists issuingthe call for the public to “save the turtles.”

The precise date that scholarship and credible scholarssteeped in leatherback sea turtle lore melded into ideologyand ideologues of advocacy was February 17, 2003. That wasthe day an assemblage of marine biologists stepped across avery fine line taking with them snippets of leatherbackscholarship to convince the media and the public that whatthey had to say about longline fishing, swordfish, andleatherback sea turtles was credible and worthy ofinternational attention and action. A close comparison ofthe scholarship cited against the language of advocacysuggests quite a different story.

That day a panel of distinguished marine biologistsassembled at the equally distinguished Annual Meetings ofthe American Association for the Advancement of Science(AAAS) in Denver for a presentation on “Conserving MigratoryMarine Organisms: Protecting Animals with Ocean-SizedHabitats.” There the Leatherback was crowned “the world’smost endangered sea turtle.” Its biological extinction waspredicted “in the next 10 – 20 years” unless immediateaction is taken globally. The presenters issued a challengeto U.S. consumers to choose to “consume less swordfish” inorder to “reduce the impact on critically endangeredleatherbacks.” (SeaWeb)

Despite the fact that scholars are acting as the leadsin this effort, the campaign to save the leatherback andshut down the commercial longline fishery for swordfish isnot intended to play to fellow marine biologists, but to themedia and politicians. Therein lays the ingenuity of thecampaign. Instead of environmental advocacy groupsclamoring to save the turtles, credible marine biologistsare issuing the challenge with NGOs acting as seconds inmedia interviews.

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The campaign did indeed find immediate appeal with themedia. No less an authority than the National GeographicNews seized on the story printing quotes that “over the last22 years (leatherback) numbers have declined in excess of 95percent” and offering a more explicit formula for reversingthe alleged trend where “Leatherback sea turtle populationshave been decimated by a fishing technique known aslonglining.” (Roach) To save the turtles, the authorwrites “scientists say the most important step is to place animmediate ban on longline and gillnet fishing.” The story alsoreferences a Pew Charitable Trusts study of longlining andquotes Sea Turtle Restoration Project Director Todd Steinerwho linked the issue with its campaign against swordfishconsumption in California because of traces of methylmercury found naturally in the pelagic fish.

A Glaring Credibility Gap

The world’s marine turtle biologists are divided on themerits of the campaign to lay the blame for theleatherback’s Pacific nesting numbers decline; for a numberof compelling reasons. A reference in the NationalGeographic story suggests one salient point of dissension,even if the author himself missed the point altogether.National Geographic writer John Roach wrote “Scientists areuncertain as to what attracts the leatherbacks to the(longline) hooks, which are used primarily to catchswordfish and tuna.” The answer is nothing attracts the bigturtles to longline hooks. Those hooks are baited withflesh, usually squid. Leatherbacks do not eat flesh. Theyeat jellyfish.

It is reasonable to expect that leatherbacks might beattracted to jellyfish entangled in longline gear, but the

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incidental catch numbers documented over the years suggesttheir involvement with longline gear is quite accidental andmortality is insignificant. Those are not the only pointsthat raise serious questions regarding the credibility ofthe campaign to shut down the longline swordfish fishery.

Ignored in the controversy by the press and thebiologists behind the campaign is the mass of scholarshipthat flatly contradicts virtually every point used to equatelonglining for swordfish with the alleged demise of theleatherback. In fact, leatherback turtle experts flatlydisagree that the species is as in danger of extinction asthe campaign’s supporters claim.

Just as the Pew/SeaWeb/NRDC campaign to give Atlanticswordfish “a break,” capitalized on the safe bet that themedia and consumers would not probe deeper than pressrelease journalism and discover that national andinternational fisheries management agencies were well ontheir way to revive Atlantic stocks of swordfish long beforethe consumer moratorium advocacy campaign was launched, sotoo are the organizations aligned against the longlineswordfish fishery counting on the media not to look to thecorpus of scholarship and management initiatives in placeand designed to reduce longline bycatch and protectleatherback turtles from real threats to their survival.

Both the United States and Canada have major recoveryand conservation initiatives dealing with longlining and seaturtles. Both countries have recovery strategies aimeddirectly at leatherback populations in the Pacific.(CanadaNRS,. NMFS/FWS RP) Despite the perception being promoted bythe campaign against swordfish longlining, the biologistsleading the campaign were not the first to sound alarms overpotential mortality caused by commercial fisheries. Thefirst of the “Actions needed” in the U.S. LeatherbackRecovery Plan states “Eliminate incidental take of

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leatherbacks in U.S. and international commercialfisheries.” The U.S. is doing just that.

In fact, the U.S. is years into its concerted effort toreduce longline bycatch including the incidental take of seaturtles. (NOAA/NMFS Jan. 2001) Since Summer of 2000, theHawaiian swordfish longline fishery has not been allowed tofish hundreds of thousands square miles of Pacific watersabove the equator for leatherback conservation. A temporaryclosing of pelagic longline fishing on the Grand Banks area(55,970 square miles) from October 10, 2000 until April 9,2001 was ordered as yet another precaution against seaturtle injury and death. Two years later, the PacificFishery Management Council (PFMC) ordered a halt to the useof pelagic longline gear within the 200-mile U.S. exclusiveeconomic zone (EEZ) off the coasts of California, Oregon andWashington State. (Lazaroff) To minimize the take ofleatherbacks in the shrimp trawl fishery, NMFS mandated thatthe turtle excluder devices (TEDs) must have larger openingsto accommodate escape of the large sea turtle. (NOAA/NMFS2003)

Two studies, “The Report of the NMFS Technical GearWorkshop to Reduce the Incidental Capture of Sea Turtles inthe Atlantic Pelagic Longline Fishery” (January 2001) andthe “Stock Assessment of Loggerhead and Leatherback SeaTurtles and An Assessment of the Impact of the PelagicLongline Fishery on the Loggerhead and Leatherback SeaTurtles of the Western North Atlantic” (March 2001),strongly point to leatherback involvement with longline gearas accidental and less than lethal. In fact, the primarysea turtle involved with longline gear is not theleatherback as the present campaign to shut down longlininginfers. It’s the loggerhead sea turtle. But withloggerhead nesting numbers approaching 100,000 in the U.S.alone, making a case for imminent extinction that wouldresonate with public empathy for that species would be

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difficult or next to impossible for the campaign architects.(F&WS)

The NMFS Technical Gear Workshop saw Dr. John Hoey listthe various factors influencing interactions of longlinegear and protected species of sea turtles and marinemammals. His presentation included how “where fishingoccurs (area and depth contour), when gear is deployed(season and time of day), and how it is set (type of bait,hooks between floats, gangion and dropper lengths, distanceto oceanic fronts) can affect the rate and composition ofspecies caught.” Each is a commonsense factor that can bealtered to diminish sea turtle interactions. But advocacycampaigns do not seek practical solutions such as Hoeysuggests. In fact, Hoey’s recommendation that fisherymanagers take life history stages of protected species aswell as how seasonal oceanographic features affect thespecies vulnerability to various fishing gear, ifimplemented, would take the wind out of the campaign to shutdown longlining. The campaign’s architects don’t want a“turtle safe” longline fishery, they don’t want a longlinefishery at all, despite feint claims to the contrary.

During the workshop, participants also discussedstudies that show squid bait dyed blue reduces itsattractiveness to loggerhead turtles and that lightsticks,floats or entangled jellyfish might explain the presence ofleatherbacks. (NOAA/NMFS Jan. 2001) Brazilian experimentswith dyed baits not only diminished loggerhead interest butalso caused a dramatic reduction in sea bird bycatch. InFlorida experiments with circle hooks and multi-coloredlightsticks showed positive affects on reducing thefrequency and severity of sea turtle bycatch. (Swenson)

Part III of the “Stock Assessment of Loggerhead andLeatherback Sea Turtles and An Assessment of the Impact ofthe Pelagic Longline Fishery on the Loggerhead andLeatherback Sea Turtles of the Western North Atlantic”

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(March 2001) deals specifically with sea turtle/pelagiclongline interactions. Looking at 4032 longline setsobserved between 1992 and 1999 that study statedemphatically that “of the turtles caught, rarely were anyobserved to be dead.” The breakdown of turtles caught 1992-1999 listed in the study goes as follows:

Species Caught Dead Sets. Loggerhead 355 4

198Leatherback 263 1

201Green 15 2

11Hawksbill 3 0 3Kemp’s ridley 2 0

2Unidentified 14 0

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In short, the mortality rate for leatherbacks in thatstudy was a paltry 0.38 percent. The chart demonstrateswhat marine biologists have long known about sea turtleinteractions with longline hooks, namely that juvenileloggerheads and leatherbacks are the key species involved.An equally important finding in the study is that“Loggerhead turtles readily ingest baited hooks (Witzell1999). While leatherbacks are more likely than loggerheadsto become captured through entanglement in the main andbranch lines than ingestion of baited hooks. (Witzell 1984,Tobias 1991, Witzell 1999)”

The NOAA/NMFS Stock Assessment/Longline Impact studyfurther answers the allegation that the swordfish longlinefishery is the prime source of leatherback deaths.

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According to observer reports, anestimated 7,891 loggerhead and 6,363leatherback sea turtles were capturedby the U.S. Atlantic tuna andswordfish longline fisheries1992-1999of which 66 loggerhead and 88leatherbacks were estimated to havebeen released dead.

Leatherback mortality using that set of statisticsjumps by one percent to 1.38 percent. That figure, even ifincreased by ten-fold, strongly suggests that longlining isfar from a primary cause of leatherback mortality. However,in keeping with the precautionary approach characteristic ofso much of the debate over marine species, the NationalMarine Fisheries Service Office of Protected Resources setthe working estimate of lethal versus non-lethal longlineinteractions with turtles at 50 percent lethal and 50percent non-lethal, a jump of 48.62 percent over the actuallethal incidents charted by observers. If that inflatedfigure is designed to cover possible mortality occurringafter sea turtle release, it flies in the face of theobserver notes accompanying leatherback releases containedin the study. The observers state the turtles swam off withvigor in virtually every case.

It should be noted that page 131 of the study containsthe origin of one of the concepts that is simplyirresistible to news coverage of the issue. That is thequote used by the anti-longline campaign’s lead marinebiologist Larry Crowder of Duke University who said that“the more swordfish caught, the higher the rate ofleatherback bycatch.” (SeaWeb)

That direct relationship between consumer demand forswordfish versus the idea that every swordfish meal servedequals a leatherback meeting a violent death appeared awinning strategy.

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However, the study did not say what Crowder implies.The actual quote is “the bycatch rate of turtles is highlycorrelated with the numbers of swordfish caught.” (NOAA/NMFSMarch 2001) “Turtles” refers to all species, not justleatherbacks. Further the reference is to the act of beingcaught and not to turtle deaths. As demonstrated earlier,98.62 percent of the leatherbacks taken as bycatch werereleased very much alive.

The fury to cast blame on commercial fisheries for theperceived plight of leatherback turtles not only threatenslongline fisheries but also fisheries using purse seine andother gear. A recent e-mail to the CTurtle list respondedto an allegation that Mexican fishermen were killingleatherbacks. It said “Mexican tuna fishermen use purseseines to capture tuna and according to data of incidentalcapture of leatherbacks from the IATTC, only one leatherbackhas been captured incidentally in purse seine operationsfrom 1992-2002 in all of the EPO (Eastern Pacific Ocean) byall fleets. That is a rate of 1 leatherback per 11 years or0.09 leatherbacks/year.” The defense was posted by theprogram director of Defenders of Wildlife of Mexico, JuanCarlos Cantu. (Cantu)

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Seeking the True Leatherback Story

The popular literature regarding leatherback seaturtles echoes the idea of a precipitous decline in thespecies’ numbers based on the alleged benchmark of 115,000posited in 1982. As noted earlier, French marine turtlespecialist, Marc Girondot and his colleagues, discount thatnumber as “largely overestimated.” (Girondot et al) They doacknowledge that declines in traditional leatherback nestingbeaches in the Pacific including those in Malaysia, thePacific coast of Mexico and Indonesia appear to be greaterthan 80 percent. On the other hand, they cite trendselsewhere throughout the leatherback nesting range showingstable to increasing numbers. Research of 28 nestingbeaches by James Spotila and others put the world’spopulation of female leatherbacks at 20,000 to 30,000.(Spotila 1996)

Main Atlantic coast nesting beaches are in Gabon andsurrounding countries, Suriname, French Guiana, Trinidad andTobago, Guyana and Venezuela. Gabon is said to be host to30,000 or more leatherback nests while the tally for 2001 inFrench Guiana and Suriname is said to be 60,000. (Girondotet al)

Recent scholarship suggests a number of dramaticphysiological reasons why the leatherback is in a family

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(Dermochelyidae) quite separate from Cheloniidae seaturtles. These differences allow the leatherback to be theonly sea turtle or reptile capable of traveling to andsurviving in Arctic and sub-Arctic areas such asNewfoundland, Canada and Greenland in the Atlantic and inthe Bering Sea and waters off Alaska in the Pacific. Itsability to travel regularly between tropical to Arcticclimes puts it in a class with one other large marinevertebrate, cetaceans.

Similarities between whale congregations in search ofor waiting for prey suggest that approaching leatherbacksusing the research techniques now associated with whaleresearch may well provide insights into the big turtle’smovements that may help to pelagic longline fleets sailclear of predicted leatherback congregations. (Sadove)Leatherbacks differ from other sea turtles in other waystoo. One is their lack of fidelity to nesting beaches.Leatherback females that nested one year on Indian beachesspent their next nesting cycle years later on Africa’sAtlantic coast. (Hughes 2000)

Mixed in the advocacy rhetoric of the anti-longline/“save the leatherback:” campaign, is the accuratecall that Pacific populations of leatherbacks experiencedvery real declines. Threats to leatherback sea turtles arelegion and come at the hands of humans, from wild animalsand from the whims of nature particularly among PacificOcean environs (Suárez)

A great deal of scholarship suggests that egg poachingand killing of gravid female leatherbacks for meat and oilcontinues to be a problem at nesting sites from Africa toAsia. The Canadian Recovery Strategy for Leatherbacks notesthat nesting beaches in Malaysia have been “subjected tosevere overharvest of eggs (often approaching 100 %) sincethe 1940s” and that “over 80 percent of nests are affectedby poaching, predation by wild pigs” in Papua. Not

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surprisingly, egg poaching has been called the main cause ofthe collapse of the Malaysian leatherback population. (Chanand Liew, 1996) The NOAA/NMFS stock assessment study of2001 showed poaching of eggs as well as juvenile and adultleatherbacks occurs within U.S. territory. Turtles arekilled in the U.S. Virgin Islands, on St. Croix, St. Thomasand St. John. Eggs appear to be the prize for poachers inPuerto Rico. Egg consumption is seen as the prime threat tonesting populations in Costa Rica. Egg predation by humansin Costa Rica and Panama prompted the 21st Annual Symposiumon Sea Turtle Biology and Conservation to issue a resolutioncondemning the practice (J.Fraser)

A study of eight villages in Indonesia’s Kai Islandslocated between New Guinea and Australia examined theaffects on sea turtle species of the local diet that reliesheavily on fish and marine turtles for protein. Thereleatherback turtles “have been hunted in Kai for sustenanceand ritual purposes for many years.” (Suárez)

Villagers hunt leatherback sea turtle with harpoons,treble hood and drown them in local gill and shark netfisheries. Attracted by the large numbers of jellyfish thatcongregate around the Kai Islands from October to January,leatherback sea turtles have been part of the culturalactivities and traditional diet of these island people forat least seven generations. “Tabob,” the local name forleatherbacks, have been the object of a traditional andritual-filled hunt during that time. The hunt itself istied to the ritual of Adat whereby villagers are required tohunt the large turtles both for subsistence and to honor thewill of ancestors only. The Adat rituals forbid any tradeor sales of meat, eggs, or any other part of the Tabob.Estimates put as many as 100 mature turtles taken in thisfashion each season.

The flesh, scutes, and eggs of five other marine turtlespecies (Olive ridley, green, flatback, hawksbill, and

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loggerhead) that frequent Kai Island waters are eaten, soldand traded with mature turtles killed at nesting beaches.Unfortunately, as islanders grow away from their traditionalcultural beliefs, the Adat ban on commercial trade inleatherbacks is being ignored. Leatherbacks are beinghunted in greater numbers with fewer ritualisticrestrictions. (Suárez)

Nesting leatherbacks are being killed in Ghana (two-thirds of nesting adults), in Sao Tome, West Africa, in St.Lucia, and in St. Kitts and Nevis. Aerial surveys suggestthat all the eggs laid in Guyana are harvested and 80percent of that country’s nesting adult female turtles arekilled.

If the females in South and Central America escapeslaughter near or on nesting beaches by humans, their tripback to the sea might be blocked by jungle cats such asjaguars.

Egg/hatchling survival is not threatened solely fromhuman, animal or insect predation. Storms, high tide andcrashing surf all contribute to the destruction ofdeveloping sea turtle life in the nest. Beach camping,campfires, construction of buildings, sea walls, beachroads, “armoring” of beaches by dumping huge amounts of sandcrushes nests, and, of course, vehicular driving on beachesall threaten turtle nests.

Once hatched, leatherbacks like all sea turtles face adaunting array of predators looking for a tasty meal ofinfant turtles as they scurry to the sea. Raccoon-likecoatimundis, ghost crabs, gulls, vultures, and hawks arejust some of the predators searching for newly hatchedturtles. If the little turtles succeed in running thatsandy gauntlet, from the time they hit the water’s edgethrough maturity, leatherbacks are fair game for yet anotherround of potentially lethal experiences. Boat strikes,

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although discounted as “not a significant source ofmortality” in the NOAA/NMFS stock assessment study, didaccount for 231 deaths from 1980-1999, more thanentanglement in fishing gear (81), ingestion of marinedebris (36) or “other” interactions (21) combined.

Human activities and equipment are not the end of thethreats to water-born turtles. Nature’s next round ofdangers includes sharks, large predatory fish and orcas(Canada)

Arguably environmentalists prefer to avoid references to sharks or orcas as predators threatening so charismatic aspecies as a leatherback sea turtle, or any other sea turtlefor that matter. But they are, particularly the tiger sharkwith its serrated teeth perfectly fashioned to saw through the tough carapace of sea turtles. Shortfin mako sharks also dine on sea turtles as do white tipped oceanic sharks and, of course, the great white shark. As voracious as the appetites that are associated with sharks may be; they are pikers compared to Killer Whales.

Recently a pod of 11 transient orcas visiting Hood Canal in Washington State’s Puget Sound polished off a thirdof the area’s 1500 harbor seals within its less than two month stay there. With males consuming 150 pounds, females eating 100 pounds, and calves needing 50 pounds of food per day, the hungry marine mammals can make short work of whatever they deem worthy to eat. (AP) To an orca whose diet includes 40-50 ton sperm whales, whose hearts alone weigh as much as two grown men, a 900 kilogram (1980 pounds)leatherback is but an appetizer.

Even without the multitude of species and activitiesdetermined to write an early epitaph for the leatherback,the sea turtle’s life is hardly one where its daily routineof swimming ever forward (they have no ability to swim inreverse) in search of jellyfish is tranquil and predator

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free. The great aquatic reptile has to deal with a veryreal and potentially lethal danger masquerading as atempting, tasty jellyfish. That danger is plastic refusefloating about the Oceans in ever increasing numbers.

To a larger degree than biologists are willing toadmit, leatherback entanglement in floatingplastic/monofilament etc. fishing gear is no different thanthe species’ involvement with pelagic longline gear.Entanglement is entanglement whether a hook is attached to aflipper or carapace.

The U.S. Leatherback Recovery Plan states “Leatherbackturtles will commonly ingest debris such as plastic bags,plastic sheets, balloons, latex products, and other refusewhich they mistake for jellyfish, their preferred food.Necropsies of stranded turtles have revealed mortalities dueto ingested garbage resulting in poisoning or obstruction ofthe esophagus.”

Swallowing a plastic lunch bag may seem like a tragicbut rare event compared to the claim by the Pew CharitableTrusts that leatherbacks must dodge 1.5 billion longlinehooks every year particularly when the numbers of turtlesnecropsied and found gagged to death by plastic wrappers areso few. (Roach) But the reality may be far greater than theperception. The reason is this. In the Pacific Ocean northof the Hawaiian Islands and west of California is the centerof the North Pacific Central gyre, an expanse of placidwater at the center of clockwise flowing currents caused bycircular winds heated at the equator and cooled at the NorthPole. Those currents force debris to the gyre’s centerwhere it collects thanks to minimal wind and virtually nocurrent influences. The 500 or so square miles of the gyrehave many variants on a nickname: the Great Garbage Patch,the Western Garbage Patch, the Eastern Garbage Patch, andthe great Pacific Garbage Patch. (Moore)

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Within that “patch” are miles upon miles of refuse,mainly plastic, that has floated about the Pacific fordozens of years. New flotsam can float the Ocean’s currentsfor a decade or so before being added to the collection. Asthe vast assemblage approximately 100-feet deep in abandonedfishing gear, baggies, and chunks of Styrofoam collected inthe gyre for the past 50 years wanders about the Pacific, itcan and does intersect with the Northwestern HawaiianIslands reefs. There tons of debris are deposited on thereefs and sea lions become entangled in plastic.(TenBruggencate) Not only does the debris itself present anattraction to leatherbacks, one of the turtle’s favoritefoods, scalps, congregate about the “patch.”

That’s 500 square miles of fishing gear and jellyfishlook-alike plastic rubbish known to be both attractive toand lethal to leatherbacks in the very Ocean where alarmshave sounded about the turtles’ declining numbers. Yet itspresence is barely mentioned in the species research or anyof the strategies to protect leatherbacks.

The statistical and observer-chronicled evidence thatthe swordfish longline fishery is the prime inhibition toPacific leatherback mortalities appears woefully lacking.However study after study built upon a mix of premises thatare being challenged for their historical accuracy and theNMFS Office of Protected Resources’ arbitrary guestimate of50 percent lethality for leatherbacks entangled in or hookedthrough the flipper by longline gear, the case againstlonglining can be made and attract a following of crediblescientists.

Dr. Grahame Webb may be the central figure who puts theissue in perspective. Dr. Webb draws an important distinctionbetween scientific precaution (avoiding conclusions that cannot bereasonably based on the data) and advocacy precaution (using anyinformation you can to promote action, on the basis of that the end willjustify the means). He likens the latter who focus only on

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negatives and ignore positive trends and successes to adoctor who continually speaks to patients in negative,alarmist terms, namely about his patients who died. Livingpatients quickly lose confidence in the physician. (Webb2003)

Advocates are pushing the concept of leatherbacksswimming to extinction despite evidence that their numbersare increasing virtually every where. That unsupportedclaim about growing leatherback endangerment from longlineencounters fits Webb’s definition of “advocacy precaution.”The NMFS decision to arbitrarily set leatherback mortalityfrom swordfish longlining at 50 percent is “scientificprecaution,” although it is ten times too precautionary.Because both are gross exaggerations, neither promotesclarity or confidence.

© 2003 All Rights Reserved. International Foundation for the Conservation ofNatural Resources.

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U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, “Loggerhead Sea Turtle Factsheet,” North Florida Field Office.

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Spotila, J, Dunham, A., Leslie, A., Steyermark, A., Plotkin, P. and Paladino, F. 1996, “Worldwide population decline of Dermochelys coriacea: are leatherback turtles going extinct?” Chelonian Conservation Biology 2(2):209-222.

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Associated Press, “Orcas feasting on seals- which helps salmon,” February 26, 2003.

Cantu, Juan Carlos, “Fw: London Times Leatherback Scarcity – WHO?” emailresponse to CTURTLE@Lists.ufl.edu. Monday, March 10, 2003.

Moore, Charles, Shelly L. Moore, Molly K. Leecaster, Stephen B.Weisberg, “A comparison of plastic and plankton in the North Pacificcentral gyre.” Marine Pollution Bulletin v. 42, n. 12 Dec 01.

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Webb, Grahame 2003, Internet correspondence with CTURTLE@LISTS.UFL.EDUregarding Leatherbacks, Saturday, February 22, 2003.

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