Earth Equity News

Turtles Are Casualties of Warming in Costa Rica. By Elisabeth Rosenthal, NYTimes, November 14, 2009. "'We do not promote this as a turtle tourism destination anymore because we realize there are far too few turtles to please,' said Álvaro Fonseca, a [Costa Rican] park ranger. Even before scientists found temperatures creeping upward over the past decade, sea turtles were threatened by beach development, drift net fishing and Costa Ricans' penchant for eating turtle eggs, considered a delicacy here. But climate change may deal the fatal blow to an animal that has dwelled in the Pacific for 150 million years. Sea turtles are sensitive to numerous effects of warming. They feed on reefs, which are dying in hotter, more acidic seas. They lay eggs on beaches that are being inundated by rising seas and more violent storm surges. More uniquely, their gender is determined not by genes but by the egg's temperature during development. Small rises in beach temperatures can result in all-female populations, obviously problematic for survival... In places like Playa Junquillal, an hour south of here, local youths are paid $2 a night to scoop up newly laid eggs and move them to a hatchery where they are shaded and irrigated to maintain a nest temperature of 29.7 degrees Celsius (85.4), which will yield both genders."