Former sea turtle hunters in Cabo Verde, off the coast of West Africa, have shifted to working in loggerhead turtle conservation along the archipelago nation’s main nesting beaches. The change was propelled by 2018 legislation that criminalized killing threatened turtle species, Sonam Lama Hyolmo reported for Mongabay.
Rangers, around a dozen of which used to poach or hunt turtles, now patrol key beaches where turtles lay their eggs, walking several kilometers each night during the nesting season, which runs from June to October. Turtle meat is historically consumed in Cabo Verde and many other regions, which has created a conflict between conservation needs and local customs. However, awareness campaigns and employment opportunities are helping to bridge that gap.
“I had turtle meat for personal consumption and never realized I could make a living out of conserving them,” Roni Nelson Batista Ramos, a ranger and camp coordinator at the Turtle Foundation, told Mongabay. “But now, I guard them against the poachers, and it’s motivating to see how these efforts have driven positive impacts for their conservation.”
Ramos and others monitor around 31 kilometers (19 miles) of coastline, patrolling the beaches on foot, and using drones and dogs for added assistance.
Roughly two-thirds of loggerhead turtle nesting activity in Cabo Verde happens on the eastern island of Boa Vista, which has seen a dramatic decline in illegal turtle hunting, according to the Turtle Foundation. In 2007, 1,253 female loggerheads were illegally caught on the island; by 2024 there were just 20. Over the same period, loggerhead turtle nests on Boa Vista increased more than sevenfold.
Cabo Verde’s loggerhead turtle population is the largest in the east Atlantic Ocean and the third largest in the world, after Oman and southeast Florida.
Another four of the world’s seven sea turtle species roam the waters of the Cabo Verde archipelago: the green turtles (Chelonia mydas), the leatherback turtle (Dermochelys coriacea), the Olive Ridley turtle (Lepidochelys olivacea) and the critically endangered hawksbill turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata).
Fishing bycatch is another significant threat to sea turtles in the region. In 2024, the Sustainable Fisheries Partnership Agreement (SFPA) renewed a five-year allowance for 56 fishing vessels from Spain, Portugal and France to fish in Cabo Verdean waters.
Read the full story here.
Banner image: A ranger measuring a turtle’s shell and collecting data at the Canto camp. Image courtesy of The Turtle Foundation.
This story first appeared on Mongabay
This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and Mongabay, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.
