From Death to Life – A Riddle of Life

Sometimes, death doesn’t mean the end but marks a new beginning.

Walking on a beach in a remote part of Andhra Pradesh, I was hopeful that I would find nesting olive ridley sea turtles trudging on the sands and laying eggs. My intention, to capture the moment in a 4K frame, and tell a story that was reflective of the elusive lives these creatures lived. Instead of finding an abundance of life, I stumbled upon a sea of remains of dead turtles – a riddle. What has since followed has been both fortuitous and an earnest quest to solve this turtle riddle – one flipper at a time.

Milieu

The olive ridley sea turtle’s name is tied to the colour of its heart-shaped shell – an olive-green hue. It is the smallest of all seven sea turtles found in the world. Elusive, unpredictable, my journey of photographing these turtles has been like none other – a juxtaposition of life and death, abundance and scarcity, hope and despair. It has evolved into a search underlined by a haunting wonder of these sea turtles navigating thousands of kilometres from hatching to feeding and back to their beach of birth. The riddle of how this natal reconnection is accomplished, is an enduring mystery I want to explore.

The role of turtles in the balance of nature is undeniable, as they contribute substantially to the biomass and influence their ecosystems not only in the sea but also on land. As natural scavengers, they have been crucial to maintaining the fine ecological balance often made unwieldy by man. The largest mass nesting phenomenon in Odisha of olive ridleys – ‘Arribada’ – is a classic example of temporary aggregations and massive concentration of biomass on nesting beaches, a phenomenon we are just beginning to understand.

What makes it more special is the cellular memory and a reflection of evolution, visible during the nesting season. During the nesting period female turtles emerge from the waters and dig deep holes in the sand and lay their eggs. They bury their eggs and return to the water, leaving the hatchlings to their own fate.

Chance encounters

While finding the ridleys was a herculean task in itself, adding to the complexity was seeking permits from the right officials. To tell this story, I quickly realised that I would need an enduring attention span and patience. After many long nights, I would often come back weathered but not beaten. I was persistent. One fateful night, when I finally saw the elusive ridley, I was shocked to see not a thriving nest, but a slew of carcasses along with a lot of plastic and garbage discarded irresponsibly, almost like a shroud.

Realisation dawned on me that the fate of turtles is especially tragic given till now, they have been extolled as the paragons of evolutionary success. They survived everything nature has thrown at them, and are aptly called ‘living fossils’ as they coexisted with dinosaurs, outlived them, and accompanied us into the Anthropocene. After having survived over 130 million years, I wondered if the greed and excess of mankind will be the insurmountable hurdle in their continued survival.

Spotting an olive ridley in unanticipated places is not unprecedented, but within weeks after my first encounter with dead turtles, I learned about nesting turtles from a conservation storyteller. This time, they found a small nesting ground in Visakhapatnam. This nesting spot wasn’t well known, as turtles came in mere hundreds. But my hope remained strong and I booked the next available flight. My heart fluttered with the long wait and anticipation to see my first nesting olive ridley sea turtle. In the midst of a crowded beach, right by a bustling city street, I saw my first olive ridley lay its eggs – a celebration of life.

Unexpected revelations can serve as precursors to action. Suddenly, there was a swirl of emotions, going much beyond an interest in photographing these incredible creatures. The innocuous turtle amidst beach-loving tourists was like a moving contradiction – a symbol of hope for coexistence?

As I took every opportunity to study these majestic creatures, I found that the nesting activity is preceded by a fascinating courtship ritual, an activity that generally occurs many weeks before the nesting season. Usually, two or more males court a single female, with the most dominant and strongest male winning the female's attention. Mating, however, is a very dangerous activity for these turtles, as the male holds onto the female while she needs to support the weight of both of them till the mating ritual is complete. In the midst of all the water acrobatics, the female also has the onerous task of breaking to the surface with both their body weight, to ensure they come up enough for air.

Human-wildlife coexistence

The beauty of nature’s creatures is their ability to coexist. Their implicit trust in the cycle of nature has helped them survive and evolve. As human beings accelerate the changes and create unknowns, I was there to bear witness and wonder if the natural instinct of these turtles would help them survive the odds. I saw this exhausted female ridley, whether based on instinct or exhaustion, lay her eggs on the open beach. I choose to believe that she seemed to know that her progeny would be in safe hands.

After watching these creatures nesting, it created within me a sense of calm, a sense of acceptance and an awe of all the possibilities. I returned to the daily grind of city life and waited for about a month for news about hatchlings coming out of eggs.

My thoughts on the coexistence of humans and the olive ridley sea turtle continued to brew, things happened serendipitously, and I chanced upon a story that gave me a new direction. From all the new relationships, the network I had built, I learnt about a hatchlings' release – the dawn of new life. I packed my bags and found myself in a remote fishing hamlet in Andhra Pradesh.

In the wee hours, I met Jaleel, an amicable and enthusiastic Fisherman. I walked towards the beach with him and his wife, Zeenat, learning how they relentlessly worked for the well-being of turtles during the pandemic lockdowns, too.

“All I have ever known is the sea. The sea has given me so much and it had never occurred to me what she needed. With the help of the government, my wife and I decided to give back to the sea by participating in turtle conservation. I have been working with Zeenat and my family for this cause for the past 10 years,” shared Jaleel.

All my experiences, the passion and perseverance of this fisherman and this sleepy hamlet made me realise that this journey with turtles was much more than a photo story, it was a journey of hope and conservation. Turtles weren't just a subject or a hobby, but I could now definitively call them a passion. The coexistence dynamics these local communities have with the sea is inspiring and is complemented by the efforts of the forest department and local NGOs towards the common goal of conserving this ‘Vulnerable’ species.

Threats

The loss of nesting habitat is a main threat. When beach erosion occurs owing to development and construction projects, sand dunes recede and along with them the vegetation. Hard surfaces are known to discourage the turtles from laying eggs. Hence, equal importance needs to be given to the land, the vegetation on the sandy shores, along with the health of our seas.

Among the other most pressing issues are incessant plastic pollution and natural predators such as birds, foxes and feral dogs.

In the recent past, with overfishing, the problem of bycatch is also on the rise. Incidental capture in commercial fisheries is an issue that needs to be addressed scientifically and systematically. Today, it's heartening to see that in most instances, fisherfolk have empathy for the turtles that have been caught in their nets, and release them even if it means losing the nets and in turn enduring financial loss. However, as the instances rise, it just may not be financially viable for them, making interventions more crucial at this stage.

The sea of hope

Despite the many challenges the olive ridley faces to simply survive, I believe that the kindness of people like Jaleel and his villagers, the work of passionate conservationists and governments will ensure the evolution of the turtle stays on course. Death does not mean the end but marks a new beginning, a new beginning where each of us makes a choice, to do whatever it takes to collaborate, to consume less, to conserve our seas and their magnificent denizens.