The Gulf of Mannar Marine National Park, which has been implementing a turtle conservation project since 2013-14, has achieved the highest survival rate of more than 95 per cent in hatching of sea turtles in its two artificial hatcheries this season.
The nesting season drew to a close last week.
The National Park launched the conservation project under Tamil Nadu Biodiversity Conservation and Greening Project by establishing two hatcheries in Dhanushkodi and Oppilan, covering a 90-km-long coastline from Arichamunai to Mariyur. With the recent release, the National Park has released a total of 1,129 hatchlings, hatched from 1,183 eggs into the sea from Dhanushkodi, achieving a very high success rate of 95.44 per cent, sources in the Park said.
Similarly, from the Oppilan hatchery, a total of 396 hatchlings, hatched from 440 eggs, were released achieving an impressive 90 per cent survival rate, the sources added.
From 60 to 90
“We still have more than 1,500 eggs kept in beds in Dhanushkodi and Oppilan hatcheries and they are expected to be hatched in batches till the middle of next month,” the sources told The Hindu .
This was a very good effort as the survival rate had gone up from 60 to 70 per cent during the last couple of years to more than 90 per cent now, the sources said.
The good result in the conservation effort became possible thanks to deployment of dedicated turtle watchers, proper collection of eggs from nests, immediate transportation of the eggs to beds in artificial hatcheries and their protection against predators, the sources said.
Ever since the conservation project was launched after the nesting season began in December, the turtle watchers and uniformed staff members kept a close vigil on the potential nesting sites and wasted no time in transporting the eggs to beds in hatcheries, the sources said. The watchers, assisted by turtle watchers, had collected about 2,500 eggs after identifying 20 nests under Dhanushkodi nesting area and another 760 eggs in the Oppilan hatchery area.
