CONSERVATION

Every year, multiple species of sea turtles come ashore to lay eggs on the beaches of South Padre Island and Boca Chica Beach. The most common nesting female we encounter is the Kemp’s ridley sea turtle (Lepidochelys kempii). The Kemp’s ridley is  critically endangered due to decades of egg harvesting in their primary nesting grounds of Rancho Nuevo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, and mortality related to shrimp fisheries before the implementation of Turtle Excluder Devices (TED) . Today, there are multiple government agencies and non-profit organizations in both Mexico and the United States working towards saving this critically endangered species of sea turtle.

Since 2007, Sea Turtle, Inc. has participated in the bi-national efforts to protect the Kemp’s ridley and other species of sea turtles that come ashore to lay eggs. Between April 1 and August 15, our interns and volunteers conduct daily patrols in the 50 southernmost miles of Texas’ beaches looking for sea turtle nesting activity. If we encounter a nesting female, we carefully tag the turtle, take a biopsy sample, and collect morphometric data in collaboration with Dr. Donna Shaver’s mark and recapture program started at Padre Island National Seashore in 1991. Once the nesting female is safely back in the water, we excavate her eggs and relocate them to a hatchery for safe incubation. After a period of 45 to 55 days, hatchlings emerge from the nest cavities and we safely release them to the Gulf of Mexico under moonlight and away from city lights. When conditions allow, we hold public hatchling releases.