A loss in the JB population: WH5608 entangled in fishing gear

The JB hawksbill population has slowly but steadily grown over the last two decades, one of the few hawksbill populations in the Caribbean witnessing this trend. The Critically Endangered hawksbill continues to decline on a global scale, depleted by hundreds of years of harvest and increasing habitat loss. Today, fishing nets present an indirect threat, entangling and eventually drowning air-breathing sea turtles. The project received news this July of a hawksbill found dead, entangled in fishing gear off the coast of the Dominican Republic. She was identified by the WH5608 serial number of the tag in her left flipper. She was one of the younger hawksbills of the JB population, tagged in 2008. Although unfortunate, this turtle provides a clue about Caribbean hawksbill migrations, revealing that a hawksbill nesting in Antigua travelled at least 1000km, most likely either feeding on coral reefs in the Dominican Republic or using DR waters as a migration corridor from her foraging grounds back to her Antiguan nesting grounds.

This also shows us that to be effective, conservation efforts of long-lived, migratory animals like sea turtles must extend past geopolitical boundaries and promote partnerships at local, national and international levels.