Study: Sea Turtle Assessments Are Wrong

Conservationists in La Jolla, Calif., say assessments of endangered Caribbean sea turtles are too optimistic.

Loren McClenachan, Jeremy Jackson and Marah Newman of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography agree conservation efforts have helped increase green and hawksbill turtle populations that nest on protected beaches.

However, the scientists argue dwindling turtle populations on many historically important nesting beaches are overlooked by conservation assessments that instead focus on the few large nesting sites that remain.

The researchers estimate today’s population of 300,000 turtles once was as large as 6.5 million adult turtles in the Cayman Islands during the 17th Century, with close to 91 million green turtles living acros the Caribbean during this same time period. For Hawksbill turtles, the researchers estimate the population has dwindled from 11 million to fewer than 30,000.

The Scripps study — Conservation implications of historic sea turtle nesting beach loss — appears in the August issue of Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.