Turtle Watching
Turtle nesting season in the east coast of Malaysia is from May to September.We got in touch with Pak Su, a well known local expert guide who brings tourists turtle watching nightly at Teluk Mak Nik, Terengganu, which is about a 15-minute drive from Club Med Cherating.
Turtles usually come up at night, so the meeting time is 9pm and can last till past midnight. Mindful of that, we "strategised" to go turtle watching on the first night of our holiday so the kiddos would not be too tired out from a whole day of activity and will be able to stay up.
We arrived at 9pm at the meeting spot. A small crowd had already gathered, comprising guests from various hotels.
After an introduction and briefing from Pak Su, we crowded around a small basket of green turtle hatchlings from Pak Su's hatchery (he buys the eggs to hatch them in his hatchery). They were the cutest little things, with their tiny little flippers. We were repeatedly reminded not to use flash while taking photos to avoid damaging the newborn turtles' eyes.
The long wait
We were waiting for reports from rangers on turtle landings. It was a rather long wait. Someone took out a plastic sheet from their truck and placed it on the tarmac road so people could sit down. We brought our own mat.
First, the Mama turtle has to crawl slowly up the shore to a safe place. Apparently, where she chooses to stop determines the gender of the babies. If she lays her eggs in the open sand, which gets heated up by the direct sunlight, the babies would be female. If she goes up higher and lays her eggs under the trees, which are shielded by the sun and, hence, cooler in temperature, the babies would be males. How cool ... and bizarre!
Once she finds a spot, she will use her front flippers to dig a shallow hole for herself to rest in. That takes about 20-30 minutes. It is not unusual for Mama turtles to stop halfway and find another spot to dig (I mean, it's like shoe shopping ... you have to find the pair that's "just right!")
Once she is happy with her first hole, she starts digging a deeper hole using her hind legs for her to lay the eggs in, which takes another 15 minutes.
Mama turtles usually lay about 100 ping-pong ball lookalike eggs each time. After that, she would rest on the beach for about an hour (who wouldn't be exhausted?!) before returning to sea. Within a season, the same Mama turtle can come ashore to nest 5-10 times!
Ok ... all that sounds really fun and exciting. But that's just what Pak Su told us ... because we didn't get to see it!
After waiting at the road for about an hour, the guide came to tell us that the turtle that had come ashore a short distance from us had trouble making it up the embankment and she was giving up and ready to turn back. So he said we can go and see her before she heads back to sea.
So we scurried to the beach to say goodbye to this beautiful green turtle.
"That's nature ...," said Pak Su. Wild, unpredictable and uncontrollable. Factors such as weather, wind and waves also play a part in the turtles' nesting behaviour.
Big hopes for lil' ones
Oh well ... at least we got to send off the little hatchlings back to sea.
After a turtle lays the eggs, rangers would remove them to be incubated in hatcheries to prevent poachers from getting to them. After 2 months, they will be released to sea and would often travel hundreds or thousands of miles through the oceans. And in 20 years, they will return to the exact beach to lay their eggs!
Hence, it was important to release the hatchlings several meters from the shore line so they can get their "GPS" imprinted in them as they make their way to the sea.
The hatchlings will follow light, so any light source had to be from the direction of the sea. We are told not to shine any light behind the baby turtles as it would cause them to go the wrong direction.
Here's our little fella making his way to the great big world out there!
According to Pak Su, about 150,000 hatchlings were released to sea at Teluk Mak Nik in 2013. But unfortunately, out of every 1,000 hatchlings, only 1 or 2 would survive. Most die due to predators, fishing nets and ingesting plastic bags mistaken as jellyfish. That's really sad statistics ... but that's nature! So it's important to save as many of the eggs from poachers as possible to increase their chances of survival.
The giant leatherback turtle, for example, is considered locally extinct in Malaysia, going from more than 3,000 females in 1968 to just 2 in 1993, according to WWF. The last landing was in 1993 at Teluk Mak Nik and 2010 in Rantau Abang, but those eggs did not hatch.
Try, try again
On the last night of our holiday, we decided to give it another go at watching turtles nesting. After all, we had come all the way for this purpose!
So we met again at Teluk Mak Nik. There was a turtle on the beach ... about 500m away! That's a pretty long walk, in the dark, on the beach, with 4 kiddos in tow. But we were determined. So I strapped a sleeping baby in my sarong sling, all 10kg of her, and the 2 elder kids volunteered to carry the basket of hatchlings.
It was a looonnngg hike. On high embankments. An elderly couple was walking with us, and we encouraged them on when they started to tire. Daddy had to take over the basket of hatchlings when it began to weigh a tonne. And did I mention I was carrying a heavy, heavy babe? Walking 1km (to and fro) on sand with weights is definitely my exercise quota for the year!
Finally we came to a spot where people started sitting down. So we sat down on our mat too. Phew! We weren't sure what was happening. No one else seemed to know either. At one stage, someone excitedly said, "The turtle is coming onto the shore!" And everyone peered into the darkness, trying to see a moving silhouette ... that turned out to be a kid playing in the sand.
After a while, I asked some of the Turtle Conservation Society members who were present for some updates. We were told that a Mama turtle was already busy digging her hole under the trees. (Ooh! It's a boy!)
So we lay down on our mats and waited. It was a cool night. Somewhat magical, in fact. The skies were filled with shiny little diamonds, and there were a few shooting stars. Waves crashed to shore, forming a soothing night-time soundtrack. We didn't take any photos (no flash allowed), but that moment on the beach in the dark of night was definitely an amazing experience saved into our memory banks.
Anyway ... we got news that the turtle abandoned its dig midway! Oh no! Apparently her head hit a tree root, so she decided to go dig somewhere else. That meant another 45 minute wait (if she doesn't abandon dig again), and it was already 11pm.
And the kiddos, who had been troopers all these while, even after a few full activity-packed days, were starting to get restless. One needed to pee. Another said he was falling asleep. And Baby woke up unexpectedly, and we didn't have any of her stuff with us. And we were a looonnngg walk, on sand, from the car. With a long drive home the next day.
So we made the difficult decision to head back without seeing the turtle laying eggs. On our walk back, Pak Su pointed out another turtle at the shoreline that was turning back to sea after failing to climb the very steep and high embankment. "That's nature!"
The kids were disappointed they didn't get a chance to release the hatchlings. But we promised that we would return next year to try again! And we will be back!
p/s Oh ya ... in case you were wondering, we paid RM35 per adult and RM25 per child (excluding Baby) for our turtle watching adventure. Club Med Cherating also offered the same excursion (with the same guide and at the same venue) ... but at almost 5x what we would pay! (albeit including transport). So yes, you are welcomed!
Cherating Turtle Sanctuary
We also visited the Cherating Turtle Sanctuary, which is walking distance from Club Med Cherating. Admission is free. The exhibits looked a bit old and not too impressive. It's a pity that we don't showcase our country better, especially when we have so much to offer.
 |
| Model showing baby turtles hatching out of ping-pong balls |
The highlight was probably the baby turtles swimming in the pool area. There were so many of them — chasing each other, biting the other's tail, climbing on one another or just chilling. Normally visitors are also allowed to release the hatchlings to the sea, but it was Raya time, and the sanctuary was closing early that day.
We saw some Hawskbill turtles too. They had really pretty coloured shells and very easily recognisable, thanks to Finding Nemo.
 |
| Imma just-a chillin' dude! |
 |
| Checking on some terrapins |
If you've crawled slowly to the end of this lengthy post, I hope you enjoyed reading it :-)
I think it's best to leave our firefly excursion for a separate post. So stay tuned for that!
No comments:
Post a Comment