It is 6.45 am. Mohan Upadhye is in the hatchery, readying to release the Olive Ridley hatchlings into the sea. A crowd of spectators has gathered outside; peeping through the openings of the wire mesh that serves as the hatchery’s walls. All eyes are fixed on the upturned cane basket lying on the sand covered with burlap. A volunteer lifts the basket to reveal four hatchlings; and the crowd cheers. The hatchlings take little strides towards the water as soon as they are released on the shore. After getting their first wash by a mild wave, they wipe the sand off their eyes with their tiny flippers and plod along, until the next massive wave takes them into the sea. The coastal village of Velas, 230km from Mumbai in the Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra may soon become a biodiversity heritage site. The Velas beach accounts for 40% of the total Olive Ridley nesting that occurs on the 720km-long coastline of the state. Villagers once harvested, ate and sold turtle eggs without guilt. Their nests were also vulnerable to jackals, dogs and ghost crabs. Today, the village is an example of the “Conservation for livelihood” model. The tide turned in 2002. That year, Bhau Katdare, founder of Sahyadri Nisarga Mitra (SNM), a Chiplun-based NGO working towards wildlife conservation, initiated nest protection efforts by enlightening locals about the need for conservation; and offering egg harvesters a higher amount of money for saving a nest than they would earn by selling the eggs. The village played host to its first turtle festival in 2006. While six households offered homestays in the maiden year, the number has reached 31 this year. Tourists are offered dormitory-style accommodation and delicious meals prepared in Konkani style, served on banana leaves. Those locals who can’t provide homestays help in cooking and serving meals, thus earning a share of the ecotourism re-venue. “I joined the conservation movement only in 2012; a decade before that, I used to enjoy my omelette of 10-12 turtle eggs”, says Virendra Patil (36), who learned to poach turtle eggs from his father while he was still in school, and now uses the same expertise to save turtle nests. Volunteers patrol the beach throughout the nights during the nesting season, looking for egg-laying females coming to the shore. “As soon as she returns to the sea, we collect the eggs lest a jackal vandalize the nest, and relocate them in a pit of the same depth and size in the hatchery,” explains Upadhye, who is spearheading the conservation efforts in the village. In the last 14 years, not a single turtle egg has been stolen, he adds. Since the tourism generated by these turtles has given the village economy a boost, the Velas Gram Panchayat has become fiercely protective of the endangered Olive Ridleys. In 2012-13 it passed resolutions prohibiting water and sand sports on the beach to facilitate undisturbed nesting and hatching of turtles. It has also resolved that the beach will not be lit up at night, as artificial light is known to disorient turtles. Sea turtles ingest synthetic debris mistaking it for food, which eventually chokes them to death. To combat this hazard, the Panchayat has prohibited the use and sale of thermocol plates and cups from this year. Despite these efforts, the number of hatchlings has come down from 2700 in 2002 to 450 this year. Upadhye hopes that this decline will start reversing in the next two years. “Our conservation movement will complete 15 years next year; and Olive Ridleys reach sexual maturity at the age of 15; though only one in a thousand survive to reach that age. As sea turtles return to the same beach where they hatched, a behaviour described as natal homing, we are hopeful to see the hatchlings we protected return to Velas as egg-laying females,” signs off Upadhye with a twinkle of hope in his eyes. While the village has been successful in protecting turtles on the ground, much needs to be done to safeguard the turtle in the sea. Barges loaded from nearby bauxite-mining sites sail close to the shore during high tide, disturbing nesting females swimming to the shore. “They should avoid sailing at night during the turtle nesting season”, says Sameer Mahadik, who has been protecting turtle nests here for 12 years, and has counted eight dead turtles on the beach just last year. Now with Maharashtra State Biodiversity Board (MSBB) planning to give the beach a biodiversity heritage site status, locals hope that they will be better equipped to save the creature they revere as an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. To the tourist returning from the village of turtles, a poem displayed outside the hatchery provides food for thought. It makes a reference to the Kurma Avatar, Lord Vishnu’s turtle incarnation, which helps the gods regain their immortality in the Hindu myth of ‘Samudra Manthan’ in the Bhagavata Purana. As humans continue to spread their plastic footprint over land and sea, the turtle itself is in need of the elixir of life. For a creature that has survived a 100 million years, a shot in the arm will go a long way.
2016, Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd.