The Leatherback Trust is a non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation and study of

sea turtles Sea turtles (superfamily Chelonioidea), sometimes called marine turtles, are reptiles of the order Testudines and of the suborder Cryptodira. The seven existing species of sea turtles are the flatback, green, hawksbill, leatherback, loggerhead, ...

and freshwater turtles, with special regard for the

leatherback sea turtle The leatherback sea turtle (''Dermochelys coriacea''), sometimes called the lute turtle or leathery turtle or simply the luth, is the largest of all living turtles and the heaviest non-crocodilian reptile, reaching lengths of up to and weights ...

. The Leatherback Trust was founded in 2000 to help consolidate

Las Baulas National Marine Park Las Baulas de Guanacaste Marine National Park ( es, Parque Nacional Marino Las Baulas de Guanacaste) is a National Park of Costa Rica and a Ramsar Site. The park is managed by the Tempisque Conservation Area, and covers approximately a marine ar ...

, one of the last major nesting site for the critically endangered leatherback turtle in the Eastern Pacific Ocean.http://www.seaturtlestatus.org/report/view. Volume 1. The park protects Playa Grande, Playa Ventanas, Playa Langosta, the ocean out to 12 nautical miles, wetlands, highlands, and the coast inland to 125 m from the high tide line. The Leatherback Trust also supports other sea turtle conservation initiatives throughout

Costa Rica Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...

and around the world. The Leatherback Trust currently supports conservation projects for the leatherback,

green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 Nanometre, nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by ...

and

olive ridley sea turtle The olive ridley sea turtle (''Lepidochelys olivacea''), also known commonly as the Pacific ridley sea turtle, is a species of turtle in the family Cheloniidae. The species is the second-smallest and most abundant of all sea turtles found in th ...

s in Costa Rica; leatherback and loggerhead sea turtles in South Africa; loggerhead sea turtles in Greece; and

hawksbill sea turtle The hawksbill sea turtle (''Eretmochelys imbricata'') is a critically endangered sea turtle belonging to the family Cheloniidae. It is the only extant species in the genus ''Eretmochelys''. The species has a global distribution, that is largel ...

s in the US Virgin Islands.

Las Baulas National Marine Park

was formed by a Presidential decree in 1991 and officially confirmed by law in 1995.Spotila, J.R., Paladino, F.V. (2004) Parque Marino Las Baulas. In Biodiversity conservation in Costa Rica: learning the lessons in a seasonal dry forest by Frankie, G.W., Mata, A., Vinson, S.B. University of California Press. Prior to the creation of the park almost 100% of all the sea turtles eggs laid in the region were collected illegally (poaching), but now this has been effectively ended.Santidrián Tomillo, P., Saba, V.S., Piedra, R., Paladino, F.V., Spotila, J.R. (2008) Effects of illegal harvest of eggs on the population decline of leatherback turtles in Las Baulas Marine National Park, Costa Rica. Conservation Biology 22: 1216 – 1224. To achieve this, the Park trained former poachers as eco-tour guides. Those guides now take tourists to see nesting sea turtles.

now hosts guided sea turtle tours over the entire leatherback sea turtles nesting season, spanning from October until March. The Leatherback Trust played a key role in supporting the government of Costa Rica in compensating landowners for property that was within the national park. Owners cannot build or otherwise disturb that land so it is reasonable that they receive fair compensation for the land, which then becomes part of the Park. The Leatherback Trust also recently embarked on an environmental education program at the local and national level.

Outreach initiatives

Two of the most successful public outreach programs cosponsored by The Leatherback Trust were The Great Sea Turtle Race and Cheer For The Turtles. The Great Sea Turtle Race used data from satellite tracked leatherback turtles leaving their nesting beaches at Playa Grande and heading to their feeding areas south of the Galapagos Islands. Using the tracking date a hypothetical race was staged between the turtles, with the winner being the turtle who reached the Galapagos Islands first. The race, co-sponsored by

Conservation International Conservation International (CI) is an American nonprofit environmental organization headquartered in Crystal City, Arlington, Virginia. CI's work focuses on science, policy and partnership with businesses, governments and communities. The organ ...

, occurred on the Internet during 2007 with the turtles sponsored by several corporations, universities and schools.Saving Sea Turtles, James R. Spotila, Johns Hopkins Press, 2011. It reached over two million people worldwide and was featured on the ''Colbert Report'' on the Comedy Central Channel in the US. A second Race, also co-sponsored by Conservation International, took place in 2008 and a third was hosted by National Geographic Society in 2009. Cheer For The Turtles used data from the nesting leatherback turtle monitoring program conducted yearly at Playa Grande. Over the duration of the 2010/11 nesting season, weekly updates were provided on the nesting status (e.g. number of eggs laid per nest, number of nests etc.) of the first 6 turtles that were encountered that season. This information was adapted into an informative narrative that was accompanied by a sea turtle biology fact-sheet.http://goldringmarinestation.org/Goldring/CheerForTheTurtles.html. Retrieved 10 September 2012.

References

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External links

Official website
Turtle conservation organizations Nature conservation organizations based in North America Environmental organizations based in Costa Rica Environmental organizations established in 2000 Animal welfare organizations based in Costa Rica 501(c)(3) organizations