Aug 2023 – Page 12

Ecologists in Action guard 1st loggerhead turtle nest in the sth Alicante / Eng/Esp

from thefreeonline on 5th August 2023 by Ecologistas En Accion
The local groups of the ecological organization of Santa Pola and Elche, in collaboration with the Elche City Council and the NGO Xaloc, will be in charge of monitoring and controlling the nest.

The local groups of the ecological organization of Santa Pola and Elche, in collaboration with the Elche City Council and the NGO Xaloc, will be in charge of monitoring and controlling the nest.

Talaiola and Margalló-Ecologistas en Acción, local groups of Ecologistas en Acción, will start up —as of next September 2— a surveillance and control device for the loggerhead turtle (Caretta caretta) nest on the Carabassí beach in Elche , formed with volunteers.

Both groups are very excited about this challenge of guarding the first turtle nest in the south of Alicante. In the words of Alberto Bernabé, a member of the Talaiola de Santa Pola group, “the nest had to be moved to Elche from our town on July 14, as it was not in a safe location for laying viability. We are lucky that the nest was moved very close, to a beach that adjoins our term, which helps us to collaborate and that this nest succeeds.”

Imágenes del Campamento Tortuga en el El Saler |

The one in Santa Pola, however, was not the first nest in the Baix Vinalopó region. A few weeks earlier, on June 26, another turtle chose a beach in this Alicante region to lay its eggs. It did so on the Arenales del Sol beach in Elche, although the nest was moved to the Saler beach in Valencia for safekeeping.

“Until now, all the clutches found in our community had been relocated to the protected beach of El Saler, with restricted access. This year, since the beginning of July, it has been decided to keep, whenever possible, the nests in their original location or, at least, in a nearby location, perhaps due to the high number of layings that have occurred, eight to date. only in the Valencian Community”, says Eleonora Brose, a member of Margalló-Ecologistas en Acción.

Elche and Denia have been the first towns chosen to host turtle nests. “In our case, it has been worth the fact that we were already prepared to host a nest in a suitable location and that we had a good group of volunteers collaborating for several years in the area of surveillance of possible nesting attempts,” he adds.