Little Cayman: Not so Little in the Eyes of the Turtles!

Little Cayman is 10 miles long by 1 mile wide and is one of the closest things to paradise that the Caribbean has to offer, dotted with mangroves, ponds and beautiful stretches of beach; ideal in the eyes of a turtle!

Known in the history books as one of the Turtle Islands (“Las Tortugas”), turtles have been returning to nest along Little Cayman’s beaches for millions of years. As with her sister Islands, over the past few hundred years Little Cayman has seen a reduction in her nesting turtles but things are starting to look up!

Little Cayman’s beaches are ideal for turtle nesting, with long stretches of untouched beaches protected by thick vegetation on the landward side. This means that turtles are able to nest all around the island and nesting sites here are idyllic compared to many beaches worldwide, where encroachment of nesting habitats by developments and lighting from beachfront properties threatens turtle nesting populations.

Nesting on Little Cayman started at the beginning of May and we have a total of 38 nests so far! We are now entering the next stage: our first two nests have already hatched and have been very successful.

On July 9^th our enthusiastic volunteers that walk the beaches for us were invited to our first nest excavation of season 2014. After turtle nests hatch and baby turtles make their way to the sea, DoE staff and volunteers check to evaluate the hatch success and fertility of nests. For the loggerhead nest excavated on July 9^th, out of 136 eggs, 106 hatched – an excellent success rate. Two hatchlings remained stuck in the nest and were successfully released that evening after sunset. These little hatchlings have a long journey ahead of them. For the major part of their early life little is actually known about what happens to these little guys and until they settle down on a foraging site after several years they are said to be in the ‘lost years’. Interestingly the majority of the turtles found in Cayman waters all year round would not have originated from the Cayman Islands. When hatchlings leave their nests on the beach and make it to the seas they weigh no more than 0.5oz and thus have little influence on where the waves and currents of the oceans take them. They are not strong enough to fight against currents and will drift wherever the current goes, being distributed throughout the Caribbean basin. If they make it adulthood then they will come home to nest, specifically returning to the same area of beach where they themselves hatched -- completing the circle of life! (Don’t lie, you now have the lion king stuck in your head!).

So in the eyes of the turtles, Little Cayman is and continues to be an ideal nesting habitat. And the continued success of the data collection and turtle conservation on the island would not be possible without our dedicated volunteers who give up their free time to walk the island’s beaches for us and report in any nesting activity. So I would like to say a massive keep going guys! You rock!

Thank you!

Lucy J