2nd ASEAN Symposium and Workshop on Sea Turtle Biology and Conservation. Click here

World’s first Trans-Boundary Marine Park between Sabah, Malaysia and the Philippines.

Introduction to the Turtle Island Heritage Protected Area (TIHPA)

History in the Development Of The Sabah - Philippines TIHPA

Management Objectives of the TIHPA

Institutional arrangements

Key Initiatives

Educational Goals Initiative Marked For Critical Funding

Research Objectives and Strategies

Economic Opportunities

Expected Deliverables

News Around the Region

Sharp decline in Turtle population

Turning to a Turtle Haven

2nd ASEAN Symposium and Workshop on
Sea Turtle Biology and Conservation

SESSION 1: Management and Conservation

ABSTRACTS

 

Total protection of a total population is rarely an option within marine turtle conservation management. Rather conservation managers can address the problem from the perspective of "What level of loss from the combined threatening processes can my population sustain?". If my total population supports 8000 breeding females annually, does it really matter if the total population loses, for example, 1000 big immature and adult turtles annually? Turtles are long lived. "Trial and error" experimental management has often not been particularly informative in the short to medium term. Increasingly computer simulations with mathematical models are used to provide guidance to the population manager. However, except for some fecundity parameters, adequately quantified demographic data essential for such heuristic modeling are non-existent for most marine turtle stocks.

The presentation will examine how a strategically planned mark-recapture and demographic study of turtles in their feeding areas can provide much of these critical data. Measured parameters include size, sex, maturity, breeding status and stock identification. These data can be used to estimate growth rates, size/age at first breeding, breeding rates, recruitment, survivorship and site fidelity. For some key parameters a minimum study of 4yr is required. This will be illustrated using the results from long term mark-recapture and demographic studies of a large herd of Chelonia mydas feeding in Shoalwater Bay in Queensland, Australia. Other options for recording some of these data will be identified. These data will be discussed within the context of the management of the stock(s) to which these turtles belong.

¹Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service, Department of Environment and Heritage, Brisbane, 4002, Australia. 
²Centre for Conservation Biology, University of Queensland, Brisbane, 4072, Australia. 
³Biology Department, University of Central Queensland, Rockhampton, 4702, Australia.