Are Bonaire’s Sea Turtles at Risk?

 

Because our sea turtles travel great distances, they are subject to worldwide threats like marine pollution, persistent hunting and incidental capture by the fishing industry. Locally, inadequately managed development poses the greatest threat to our ecosystems and sea turtle populations:

 

  • Unmanaged waste runoff pollutes reefs and foraging areas.

 

  • Nesting beaches are in danger of being damaged or destroyed by sand-mining, coral-mining and coastal construction.

 

  • Light and activity from near-shore buildings can deter nesting females and disorient hatchlings.

 

  • Tourism activities increasingly encroach on turtle foraging areas.

 

  • Poaching and deadly entanglements in fishing line and debris, though in decline on Bonaire, continue to threaten sea turtles.

 

 

Bonaireans protest sand mining that destroyed a nesting beach - photo STCB

 

 

Have you seen a sea turtle?


If so, we invite you to be a part of STCB’s Sea Turtle Sighting Program. You can record your sighting at participating dive shops. Ask for the Sea Turtle Sighting Form and enter the details of your sighting.


Participating dive shops:

BelMar

Bonaire Dive and Adventure

Buddy Dive

Carib Inn

Dive Inn

Divi Dive Bonaire

Div'ocean

Great Adventures

Port Bonaire

Toucan Diving

Tropical Divers

VIP Diving

Wanna Dive

Yellow Submarine 

 

Status of Caribbean sea turtles

Sea turtles have lived in the world’s oceans for 150 million years. Caribbean sea turtle populations were once astonishingly abundant, but a rapid decline began at the time of European expansion.

Scientists estimate that in the 1600’s, over 90 million green turtles swam the Caribbean seas. That number is now estimated at 300,000.

Hawksbill populations have plunged 99.7 %, from 11 million to 30,000. As in the rest of the world, all of the Caribbean’s sea turtles are now threatened with extinction.