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| Image by Tom Morrisey |
Thinking About Turtles
Normally, a dive on Trinity Caves is all about the topography. The "caves" here are formed by overhanging coral ridges that join to form three long arches. Between the caves you get to hang out over walls, glide up underwater ravines and zigzag between coral heads that rear up like submerged mountain ranges. And normally, the critter I would remember from a dive like this is the green moray that stuck its head out for a photo op just before we got back to the mooring line.
But what sticks in my head this time isn't the terrain or the moray. It's the turtles.
Green sea turtles are in dramatic decline in most regions of the world. Part of the reason is shoreline development that alters nesting sites and confuses emerging hatchlings. Another reason is that, over the centuries, sea turtles have been part of the diet of islanders. Combine those two, and mankind has started the clock ticking on the viability of one of the most charming elements of the ocean world.
Green sea turtles have become a common sight on most Grand Cayman dives, due largely to the fact that, at any given moment, some 16,000 of them are being cultivated at the Cayman Turtle Farm at Boatswain's Beach. That's so many turtles that, if released all at once, they would probably devastate the sponge population around the island. So the farm raises turtles until they are a year old and then releases 40 percent into the wild (a newly hatched wild turtle's chance of survival is miniscule, but yearlings have a good survival rate). Of the 60 percent that are left, about 1 or 2 percent are set aside as breeding stock, and the remainder are raised until they are three or four years old, after which they are processed for local food.
That last part might seem a bit distressing, but it keeps an island tradition alive without threatening the turtles that live in the Marine Park that completely surrounds Grand Cayman. The income produced by turtle products, together with Turtle Farm tourism revenue (the farm is Grand Cayman's largest land-based attraction), have helped ensure a steady stream of young green sea turtles into Grand Cayman waters every year since 1968, and help make a "turtle cameo" a virtually predictable — but nonetheless exciting — feature of every reef dive. On this morning's dive at Trinity, three greens (one for each cave?) will fin languidly along with us, none even the slightest bit distressed at the sight of scuba divers in their front yards.
As a traveling diver, I want to see a healthy marine environment, with all its underwater constituents represented, on all my dives. But I don't want to do that at the cost of the cultures I'm visiting.
Jacques Cousteau saw oceans as things to be both preserved and used. He saw responsible aquaculture as a viable solution to the problem of feeding a growing world. When that can be done and a dwindling species can be restored to former numbers, I see it as outside-the-box thinking that approaches an issue equitably.
And I certainly like the company it gives me on my dives.
Boatswain's Beach, the new home for the world-famous Cayman Turtle Farm, is a 30-acre marine adventure park with snorkeling lagoon, a Predator Tank and a free-flight Aviary. In addition to these and other interactive animal attractions visitors will be treated to nature trails, restaurants with local cuisine, and a whole street lined with Caymanian shops and crafts. For more information please email casandrahibbert@boatswainsbeach.ky
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