This month we widen our focus to consider what’s happening with turtles and trees on other Costa Rican beaches. News from TortuGuiones and BarriGuiones will be back next month.

Leatherback Turtle. Photo by Steve Garvie

The Leatherback Trust is an international non-profit conservation organization that protects leatherback turtles and other sea turtle species from extinction. It helped establish Las Baulas National Park to protect Playa Grande, the primary nesting beach for the East Pacific leatherback. In addition, the trust works with local communities and resource managers at secondary nesting sites of Playa Cabuyal, Naranjo, Junquillal, Nombre de Jesus, Ostional, and Camaronal.

According to the trust’s website, “In collaboration with the Earthwatch Institute, the trust uses volunteers to participate in conservation activities at Playa Grande in Las Baulas National Park. Volunteers join our research team at the Goldring-Gund Station and patrol the beach during leatherback nesting season from September to March, collecting data on nesting turtles and monitoring nests. We also invite volunteers to engage in community outreach activities and explore the park’s estuaries, home to crocodiles and monkeys.”

The Leatherback Trust has been recording data for leatherback turtles since season 1988–89, for Olive Ridleys since 2009–10, and for green turtles since 2011–12. Earthwatch reports that the leatherback turtle population has declined by about 90 percent since 1980.

For more information, see www.leatherback.org

Please keep TortuGuiones informed when you see turtles nesting or babies hatching by filling out a report: www.tortuguiones.org

We share with you this report on BarriGuiones’ parent organization Costas Verdes, which ran on Teletica Channel 7 in 2014. The numbers have increased but the message remains the same. Here is a translation:

Narrator: Trees have been disappearing from our country’s beaches. That is why the nonprofit organization Costas Verdes began a coastal reforestation project which to date has planted about 15,000 trees.

Costas Verdes Director Federico Gutierrez: We have two pilot projects. We have planted more than 8,000 trees in Playa Hermosa and more than 7,500 trees in Playa Guiones, representing more than 34 species of native trees. Our project extends from growing seedlings to planting them on the beach to everything involved in their maintenance.

Narrator: The project involves communities, schools, social responsibility branches of businesses, and volunteers. Experts advise on the choice of trees for each zone.

Gutierrez: We match the plantings to the locality. We undertake studies of the native species to determine which are best suited to a particular location.

Narrator: Reforestation makes the beaches more attractive, provides shade for tourists, and serve as home and food for flora and fauna. Costas Verdes plans to extend the project to other beaches.