“If you love nature, nature will love you back.”
Thus, reads a hand-painted statement on an old surfboard that forms part of a wooden fence at a marine turtle hatchery in Purok Dafila, Bgy. Dahican, Mati City, Davao Oriental.
The statement is the motto of Amihan sa Dahican-Balod sa Paglaom Inc., which runs the marine turtle hatchery put up by like-minded individuals back in 2004 with a small community.
Humble beginnings
Amihan is Filipino for the Northeast monsoon winds, which influences life in the Philippines in November and December to May and June each year.
The winds create powerful waves on the southern coast of Mindanao, which is perfect for surfing and skimboarding.
At the same time, the setting of Amihan signals the time when nesting marine turtles return to their birthplace to lay their eggs.
With a threefold purpose: to conserve marine wildlife species in the bay, take care of young kids, and share surfing and skimboarding skills with visitors, Amihan sa Dahican-Balod sa Paglaom was formed.
Balod, which means waves, and paglaom, which means hope—or waves of hope—became part of the group’s name as the waves inspire hope in that part of Dahican Bay.
Marine wildlife conservation
The group has been the protector of marine wildlife and their habitat in that part of Mindanao. It includes the Dahican Bay and the nesting marine turtles, an endangered species threatened by numerous factors, including hunting for food and body parts, accidental bycatch, pollution, climate change and illegal wildlife trade.
Winston Plaza, one of the group’s elders and its current treasurer, told the BusinessMirror in a telephone interview on March 12 that Dahican Bay, or the beach in Bgy. Dahican, and the waters of Mati City are teeming with marine wildlife.
There are whale sharks, dugongs, and dolphins, making it a perfect tourist spot for those with passion for amazing creatures of the sea.
“We patrol the beaches at night to protect turtle eggs from poachers and predators,” Plaza said.
Over the years, the marine turtle hatchery was slowly constructed from salvaged materials brought by the waves—from driftwood to broken surfboard, coconut trunk, nipa leaves and even fish nets.
Beautiful beach, perfect waves
Dahican Bay is a great venue to find peace and serenity, and to escape from a stressful life.
It has stunning white beaches that face the waves of sparkling turquoise water, alluring countless surfers and skimboarders having fun in the water, making it perfect for water sports activities.
Because of its pristine water and relatively intact marine ecosystem, it is frequented by large marine wildlife that makes the place more stunningly awesome.
Scholarship program
The group has an ongoing scholarship program for volunteers. However, its current financial situation is tight.
With low tourist arrivals, the scholarship is also affected, as the only source of income of the group is tourism.
The number of its scholars is down to 10, including one taking up law, four in college, one in elementary, and the rest are in high school.
Elder members of the group who are skillful in skimboarding and surfing are the group’s breadwinners like coaching newbies in the water sports. Others help local tourists, including cooking and serving as tour guides.
Marine turtle protectors
Everyday, while some attend to tourists, who require assistance in skimboarding and surfing, other volunteers, as young as 12 years old, scout the beach in their spare time during the day in search of nests.
At night, they help watch the bay, waiting for marine turtles to show up to lay eggs on the beach, the nesting ground of marine turtles.
Once the volunteers find or spot a nest, they wait for trained members of the group to collect the eggs and bring them to the hatchery, where they are protected from natural predators, including those who collect the eggs for consumption or commerce, until they hatch to become those cute little turtles that crawl out of the nest
Back to the wild
On March 19, the group released around 100 newly hatched Olive Ridley turtles.
Plaza said that in the past two months, the marine turtle hatchery has released hatchlings two to three times a week. There are only two hatcheries where eggs are kept—each hatchery measuring 4 meters by 6 meters.
Eggs come and hatchlings go during the Amihan, making the hatchery very busy this time of the year.
Three species of marine turtles nest at Dahican beach—the Green, Hawksbill and the Olive Olive Ridley, Plaza said.
From October 15, 2023, to February 13, 2024, a total of 1,141 hatchlings were released by the group. During the same period, a total of 190 eggs were recorded as unhatched.
He noted that the number of hatchlings this season is still low compared to the previous years.
Unsustainable tourism practice
Speaking in Filipino, Plaza said unsustainable tourism promotion is threatening the Dahican Bay as a marine turtle sanctuary.
“Some people take videos of nesting turtles and some are touching the tail of the turtle,” he said.
“Disturbing the turtles, such as touching the egg or parts of the turtle as they lay eggs, prompts the turtles to stop laying eggs,” he said.
Another wrong practice, he said, is collecting the eggs from the nests without proper training.
It was learned that locals are now very eager to find a nest for the P500 reward from another group that operates a hatchery without proper training from experts.
“These mishandled eggs will not hatch and will be wasted,” he said.
Climate change
Joaquin Luis Rinehart, a member of the board of directors of Amihan sa Dahican, said the declining hatchling production is notable also because of climate change.
“Amihan [weather condition] came in late that’s why the nesting turtles also came late to nest,” said Rinehart, a fourth-year environmental science student and one of the scholars of Amihan sa Dahican told the BusinessMirror in a telephone interview on March 20.
He said climate change can also be the reason why fewer eggs hatch as the incubation is affected by the temperature or prevailing weather conditions.
Unprotected area
While Amihan sa Dahican is an important nesting ground in the region, it remains unprotected by law, national or local.
Dahican Bay is neither a Protected Area nor a critical habitat. There is no proposed measure to declare it and its waters a marine protected area by the local government unit (LGU) of Mati or Davao Oriental.
Dahican Bay and other equally important nesting grounds in the country is important to help save the endangered marine turtle species and save them from extinction.
Ideal nesting ground
Asean Centre for Biodiversity Executive Director Theresa Mundita S. Lim said the Philippines and its Asean neighbors harbor beaches that can be considered important and ideal nesting grounds of marine turtle species because of the climate and beaches that are perfect for their laying eggs.
She said protecting marine turtle nests that produce the hatchlings should be protected and conserved.
“Asean has 173,000 km of coastline, longer than the United States’ 153,646 km coastal area. Marine turtles lay their eggs along suitable beach ecosystems, with the warm, dry sand allowing them to incubate and hatch in about 60 days to 70 days,” Lim said.
Saving a nesting ground, saving an entire population
Lim said the hatchlings grow into adults, the females of which will return to the same beach where they emerged and imprinted, to deposit the next generation of marine turtles.
“The loss, therefore, of nesting beaches, means the potential loss of entire future populations of sea turtles,” Lim said.
According to Lim, only healthy coastal ecosystems can support the incubation and hatching of turtle eggs, thus, development projects must take into account the presence of turtle nests and breeding grounds in their project sites.
High tourism value
Lim added that like other charismatic animals, marine turtles are important to ecotourism.
She said the value of each marine turtle for nature tourism is equivalent to P3.9 million per year, citing a study commissioned by the Biodiversity Management Bureau of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in 2021.
“Ensuring that the communities are involved in the protection of the marine turtle nesting grounds will help aid in the monitoring and preservation of eggs and hatchlings; help raise awareness on marine turtle conservation; ensure the best external conditions to protect hatchlings from predators and human disturbance; and serve as learning hubs on marine turtle conservation for scientific studies and research,” she said.
To boost the conservation of marine turtles, Lim explained that capacity building is vital for volunteers so that they are properly oriented and updated on the correct, science-based measures for protecting and managing sea turtle nesting areas.
She noted that there is a need to have the volunteers familiarized with current laws and policies relevant to conserving the turtles and their habitats.
Image credits: PHOTOS COURTESY OF WINSTON PLAZA/AMIHAN SA DAHICAN-BALOD SA PAGLAOM INC.