Watch out for that Shark…

As mentioned previously Lankayan Island is a turtle sanctuary with full time conservation staff that look out for mother turtles that come to nest on the island.  They then tag and monitor the mother, monitor the eggs and help the hatchlings into the sea.  Over the last 10 years the Lankayan staff have released over 200,000 baby turtles into the wild.  As guests on the Island we are all invited to come and watch any of the turtle activity.

Again we have been very lucky and have seen a mother come up on the beach late at night, dig a massive hole to lay her eggs in and then cover them over for protection.

We also saw some eggs hatch and around 100 baby Green Turtles head out into the big bad Sulu Sea to fend for themselves.  

The baby turtles have a tough time, and the cards are definitely stacked against them with only one of these hundred going to grow up to be a big turtle one day.

In the video you can see some of these baby turtles heading off down the beach and into the sea.  As usual there are the super keen ones racing at the front, and some others at the back doing it at their own pace.  Rather worryingly though as they make it into the sea you can also see a little-ish shark waiting for them…  One of the front runners unfortunately took a wrong turn and headed for the shark much to the horror of those watching on the beach.  The shark took a couple of big bites at the turtle’s flipper and we thought he had had it, but to our amazement the plucky wee guy started biting back!  The shark wasn’t having this and came back for more, but this time the wee turtle was smart and ‘played dead’ until the shark left him alone, at which point the wee guy set off again at super speed and escaped.  While the shark had been busy with this wee guy most of the other babies had made it into the water and off on their big journey, and to the relief of all on the beach the shark appeared not to have any lunch today.  ‘One for the team’ wee guy!

We hope the brave wee guy and all his brothers and sisters make it in the big bad Sulu Sea.

Mr & Mrs M