Great Turtle Race

Where We Stand|Poachers to Protectors|The People

ong before the wide beach called Playa Grande had a name, sea turtles knew it as a good place to lumber slowly from the ocean and deposit their leathery eggs in nests they excavated above the high-tide mark. In the mid 1900s when Dona Esperanza gathered some of those eggs, the nests were built by olive Ridley turtles. Leatherbacks were not yet regular visitors when the area was called Salinas and a handful of humans made a living in a small commercial salt industry around local salt brine ponds. About 40 years ago, recalls Dona, “turtles as big as four people” began depositing clutches of billiard-ball size eggs into the sands -- and bellies -- of Playa Grande.

Initially, gathering was limited. Each family fed off one nest or less for several days. This changed in the early 70’s, when a road was built to connect the remote and pristine coast and its nesting beaches with the teeming capital city of San Jose. Sea turtle eggs were rumored to enhance human male sexual activity. The bigger the egg, supposedly the more potent the male. By the early 80s, an insatiable market in San Jose led locals to stake out territories and strip the nests of eggs. Dona Esperanza patrolled the beach on horseback to enforce the unwritten territorial agreements, even though poaching turtle eggs was illegal.

Many residents believed that the abundance of turtles – hundreds a night during the nesting season -- ensured a non-stop supply of eggs. They couldn’t imagine an end to the bounty, said the locals, some of whom were poaching from each other. But one scientist was taking note. A pioneering researcher from San Jose, Maria Teresa Koberg, arrived in 1988 and started patrolling the beaches to stop the poaching. Concerned for the woman walking alone on the embattled beach, Dona Esperanza patrolled with her and helped her record data: turtles arriving, nests dug, eggs laid, eggs taken by poachers.

Koberg was tireless in her efforts to educate locals about the value of protecting the nests rather than exploiting them. She recruited Boy Scouts, students, and friends to guard the nests. She convinced local poachers to become protectors and guides. In 1991, as a result of a vigorous campaign by Koberg, local residents, including Costa Ricans and some American ex-pats, and leatherback scientists Jim Spotila of Drexel University and Frank Paladino of Purdue University, the area became Parque Marino las Baulas, part of Costa Rica’s national park system.

In 2000, the scientists and colleagues published a groundbreaking paper in Nature detailing the precipitous decline of nesting Pacific leatherbacks. In the early 80's, up to 200 leatherbacks were observed nesting each night on Playa Grande. Fifteen years later, during the 96-97 season, the numbers of turtles plummeted to 10 a night.

While Playa Grande, Ventanas and Langosta are the three gems of Las Baulas Park, the tranquility of these white beaches is deceptive. Because humans love wide sandy beaches as much as turtles, development continues at an alarming pace. At night, the lights from houses in neighboring Tamarindo, whose beach used to attract leatherbacks, long ago drove off adult females who will only nest on dark beaches. Paladino and Spotila want to encourage sustainable and limited development behind the Las Baulas beaches to keep the area dark and attractive to the giant reptiles.

To do so, they have emerged from their scientific cocoons to become active conservationists. Today, Paladino oversees a research and conservation program staffed in part by international teams of Earthwatch volunteers. Spotila founded the Leatherback Trust, a U.S.- and Costa Rica-based nonprofit organization that provides the funding for the Costa Rican government to buy property from people who own property within the park borders.

In 40 years, a sea-change has occurred in Playa Grande. The local community supports, is engaged in, and helps lead the efforts to protect the animals they once unwittingly were driving to extinction.

“I respect the turtles,” says one young park guard, who today follows in the footsteps of his father an early poacher-become-protector. The young man has never thought of the turtles as anything other than ancient creatures whose presence enriches the lives of humans who marvel at their size. “They were here before us.”

-- by Diane Richards

March, 2007