CHENNAI : As the sky darkens and the crows soar away, 20-odd newly-hatched black Olive Ridley turtles wriggle their leaf-like flippers on the beach at Besant Nagar’s Broken Bridge. Amid urges of “You can do this!” and cheers from children, the hatchlings — yet to grow into the namesake olive — reach the coast, and the waves sweepingly welcome them home.
From February-end to the start of April, beaches along the east coast draw large crowds — especially younger ones — eager to glimpse the turtles — classified as vulnerable species — hatch. In the stretch between Broken Bridge and Urur Olcott Kuppam, a green enclosure incubates the ping-pong ball-sized eggs in replicated nests. Once a depression forms on the egg and grains of sand slowly slip inside, woven baskets are placed above the eggs, and the turtles are soon ready to journey into the ocean.
“After 45-60 days, depending on the temperature, the turtles hatch and after they get out of their nests, the babies are programmed to move towards a brighter light, which is the stars and moons reflecting on the horizon of the water, to get to the sea,” says Nishanth Ravi, a member of The Students Sea Turtle Conservation Network (SSTCN) and the forest department. He adds that often due to streetlights in cities, the hatchings end up being run over by vehicles, eaten up by feral dogs, or trapped by people. Volunteers often guide the palm-size turtles to the shore with mobile phone flashlights.
Owing to conservation efforts, Chennai has one of the highest nesting populations of Olive Ridley Turtles, says the volunteer. This year, according to official data as on April 6, around 23,000 hatchlings were released, and 481 nests were found. In 2021-22 and 2020-21, as many as 490 and 387 nests were respectively found.
Turtle walks
During the last 35 years, SSTCN volunteers and forest department staff traverse the length of the city’s coastline to collect eggs. Nishanth explains that they walk in two shifts — 11.30 pm to 3.30 am and 3.30 am to 5.30 am. Eggs are collected on two paths from Neelankarai to Besant Nagar and Marina to Kauveli Estuary. Equipped with a handy flashlight, volunteers trek 17 km across the coast and watch out for a train-like track that signals a nest. Located with a metal probe, these eggs are carefully piled into cloth bags, and placed in four hatcheries across the city.
According to the volunteer, while the number of eggs collected was high as usual, the garbage inflow across the coast was also high. “River widening started post-monsoon and we had almost tonnes and tonnes of garbage piled up daily. Generally, we do clean-ups before the start of the season but this time, clean-ups were difficult as garbage was stuck inside the sand.”
In the late 2000s and late 90s, the construction of the Ennore Port cleared off several nesting beaches. Marina Beach now sees much more nesting as the nesting was diverted from the beaches that disappeared under the port.
Origins of egg collection
Over 40 years ago, a baffled fisherman brought a seemingly peculiar sea turtle to Romulus Whitaker, the founder of the Madras Crocodile Bank Trust. “They found the turtle’s nest was 40 cm deep and later found that beings walked to bright lights in the sea. He started collecting the nests and left them in friends’ houses in Neelankarai. He found that temperature dependency, and not chromosomes, decides the sex of a hatchling,” explains a volunteer, Abhishek, during a public interaction at Besant Nagar.
The SSTCN was set up in 1987, and run by students from the Madras Christian College, says the volunteer. “We attempt to make sure the turtles make it safely to the sea. Around 1 in 100 survive from the nest. Around 50% of predation happens on land,” explains the volunteer. Patiently taking questions from the crowd, dominated by impatient children and teenagers, Abhishek dishes out facts: Olive Ridley turtles are the fastest swimmers in the sea or the hatchlings are only 4 cm in height.
As the last hatchling is nudged towards the coast by the flashlight and eventually gulped by the sea, the crowd cheers and disperses. One child remarks that the last turtle flapped its way to the sea and lost the turtle race. Eleven-year-old Vybhav lags. “I hope they built a Great Wall of Besant Nagar to block all the light from the streets so the turtles survive,” he says. Like many children, Vybhav reports he will be back next year.
With an in-built compass, this year’s female hatchlings — the lucky ones that survive — will return to Chennai to lay their eggs in 13 years. Perhaps, next time, Besant Nagar might just have a great wall.