Olive Ridley hatching in Orissa

‘ARIBADA’ it may sound wired to some people but it is one of the most extra-ordinary incidents that happen in our natural world. Every year thousands of Olive Ridley turtles come to 3 beaches of Orissa, India in the month of January for laying eggs. This is called ‘Aribada’.

The eggs hatch in the month of May. This year I and 2 other folks went there to see the hatchlings. We get off the train at Chandrapur and from there it was a half an hour journey into the interior of Orissa. The beach of Puranabanda is a very remote beach far from the chaos of tourist and all that. It is actually a fishing village of Rushikulya. We stayed with our host society ‘Rushikulya Sea Turtle Protection Committee’. There is no other option for staying overnight for now. The people there are very much friendly.

In the next day morning we went to the beach to see the turtles hatch. The beach had protective fencing put up by the Forest Dept. When we went inside there was nothing. One or two people like us, some small local boys and three four Forest Dept. workers were there. But one thing was numerous, the crows. And in-spite of the fencing, 2-3 dogs have entered the area but no sign of the turtles. So I started to follow the dogs. Suddenly I saw a dog picked up something dark from the ground. I rushed to the area and oh! there it is, a small baby turtle. And as I was concentrating on the single turtle, several others have come out of the nest. That was the start. After that we found numerous nests from where the babies were emerging. They were just every where. But just near the tide line where the nests got exposed by the sand erosion of the sea waves, the eggs were not so lucky. More over there were predator everywhere, crows, black kite, brahminy kite, stray dogs, crabs all were ready to make a feast with the turtles. For that reason the forest dept has hired workers to collect the hatchlings as soon as they emerge from the nest and release them at the sea shore to minimize the chance of predation. But the solution is not very perfect, there we meet a researcher from USA who was worried seeing this technique. In her words the babies imprint the location of the nesting beach in their head at the time when they crawl from nest to sea. So if they don’t get a chance to crawl they might not remember the location. What we came to know about the mortality rate of these turtles is that only one in a thousand survives to become adult!!!! Well, now they have emerged from the nest, immediately they start to crawl towards sea. Generally they hatch in the night. So, how they navigate to the sea?? It is also interesting. They follow the reflection of the light of the stars on the sea. Experiment shows that they follow any source of light. That is why any kind of light is banned on these beaches in the night, because they can mislead the hatchlings. They may look like clumsy but they are pretty fast crawlers. When they reach the se shore they are washed away with the waves into the sea. There they began the real journey of there life. When they will mature, the female Olive Ridleys will come back to this same beach to lay there eggs only if the beach is still there for them. It is our responsibility to save this habitat and the turtles, which is already claimed as critically endangered if we want to witness this wonder of nature times and times again.