Ridley turtles hatch on city beach
First time in 2 decades
Thursday morning saw at least 80 baby Olive Ridley Turtles at Versova beach for the first time in two decades. Little were the morning walkers aware of these creatures waddling into the sea when Afroz Shah, a clean-up crusader, and his team spotted them.
Activists and animal welfare groups immediately got into the act and ensured that the baby turtles were safely led to the sea. “We had to ensure that they navigated their way from the hatching site, which was around 30-35 metres from the shore. We had to shoo away the dogs since they tend to kill these creatures,” said Shah, who had begun the Versova beach clean-up project 126 weeks ago.
Marine experts and officials from the state mangrove cell said that the episode of turtles hatching on Mumbai’s shoreline has been reported for the first time in 20 years. “We will push for development of a turtle rescue centre within the premises of the nesting site.
We hope and expect to build it soon,” said Prashant Deshmukh, range forest officer of western region, Mumbai Mangrove Conservation Unit. The Versova beach was considered to be the dirtiest in the city, until Shah and his team started cleaning it up over a period of 126 weeks. They have now removed more than one crore kilos of plastic and other garbage from the periphery of the beach. The crusade continues.
“It is a historical moment for the city. Nature has blessed us citizens for all the hard work we did for it. We have begun combing operations in the area to check for possibility of more nesting sites. We want to ensure that turtles do not face any problems in reaching the sea,” Shah added. Olive Ridley turtles are best known for their behaviour of synchronised nesting in mass numbers.