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Sergeant majors swarm around the camera lens, attracted by chum intended to attract sharks.
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A young lemon shark cruises above me in a tidal pool.
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An adult female green turtle may emerge from the water as many times as six times in a season, laying dozens of eggs at a time. It is estimated that for every thousands eggs laid, only one or two hatchlings will make it to adulthood.
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Warden Zelia Brito and her assistant Carlos Barao Eduardo measure a female Green turtle who has come ashore to lay her eggs. While the turtle chooses her nesting site and digs her nest, Zelia and Barao are careful not to disturb her. But once these turtles begin to lay their eggs, nothing can stop them. A quick check of her flipper tag, and few measurements do not seem to bother the mother turtle.
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Tim Calver is an accomplished underwater wildlife photographer and a veteran shark researcher in his own right. Click below to learn more...
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We found sharks in that second pool -- fifteen or twenty young lemon sharks. All of them bore little scars from our DNA sampling work, marking them as Lama Lagoon sharks. They drifted through the pockets of the pool, in and out of the corners and the dead ends. I swam behind a small group of them, cornering five sharks for a moment in a rocky alcove. They swam in circles an arm's length away. They seemed content to share the space, but when I pressed too closely, they began swimming in erratic lines and finally darted past me into the open water.
The turning tide put an end to our exploration. Waves began to spill over into the pool...it was time to go. The little lemon sharks started to expand their range as incoming water deepened and widened their pool. Soon, they would be able to leave this low-tide refuge and make their way back to their high-tide haven in Lama Lagoon.
I ended my day walking the beach with Island Warden, Zelia Brito and her assistant, Baroa. Zelia had invited me to watch turtles as the haul themselves out of the ocean to lay their eggs. She led the way, occasionally using her flashlight to find a safe path over the rocks. The moon -- a day or two past full -- still lit the beach in bright, clear light. Wide drag marks in the sand led to our first turtle -- a large green -- one of two species found in the waters around Rocas, but the only type to lay eggs here. I thought about how graceful she would be in the water, and about the huge and awkward effort required for the big turtle to travel a short distance over the sand and to dig the pit where she now laid.
Zelia and Baroa checked tag numbers and recorded measurements. With her flashlight beam she illuminated a hole within the turtle's nest, full of eggs. The mother turtle's flippers and shell partially obscured the clutch, so we were unable to count the eggs. Every thirty seconds or so, another soft shell would drop soundlessly onto the pile. I watched the turtle's eyes. They were encrusted with sand which had collected in her tears. Her eyes watered ceaselessly.
We moved away to leave her in peace and darkness and watched her shadow from a distance. After an hour or so, her massive silhouette began to move down the beach. Every few yards, she would stop and draw a loud breath, gathering the strength to plod on. Finally, her shadow merged with the shallow water. The sand was washed from her eyes. Her body once again was enveloped in a medium that granted her speed and grace. With the next wave and a stroke of her flippers, she was gone. |
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Maureen Kuenen kicks through the sandy tide pool shallows.
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Originally built in the early 1900s, the old lighthouse on Atol das Rocas is now crumbling into the sea. Many local ghost stories are set in and around this stone building.
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