Our turtle enclosure is up!
We have been asked to give some turtle husbandry training to people on nearby Felivaru (the island with the tuna canning factory) so have been preparing for that. They are raising the green turtle hatchlings in an effort against the poaching that would otherwise happen and are keen to learn good practices for handling and rearing turtles. They also want to monitor nesting sites on the island so we'll be training them to identify turtle tracks and nests. We plan to combine the data they collect with our own to learn more about the breeding habits of turtles in this atoll.
The training was meant to happen this Thursday but has been postponed for about a week. Which is quite normal. It did frustrate me to begin with, however I've learned to just go with the flow. I've also learned to have presentations and information ready to go as we could suddenly be called on to give the presentation with less than a days notice! It was a relief to find out we don't have to present it in Dhevehi. While I understand or occasionally get the gist of conversations, speaking it is a whole different kettle of fish!
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| L-R: Sam, Patchi, Chloe, Rachel and Alka |
Four more volunteers arrived in Naifaru this week with three volunteering in the marine programme. Sam, Chloe and Rachel have been a great addition and it's fab to have the extra hands to help out. And while Alka didn't sign up for the marine programme (she's teaching in the local school), she's still dragged in to help us when school is over.
We've all been working hard out around the marine centre to get it finished. We've planting about another 60 trees and have started to paint the walls of the centre. The only thing about the extra trees means there's more trees to be watered each morning. They do look pretty cool though and I'd love to say I'll be back in about 6-7 years when they're fully established...wait and see!
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| Digging holes - tough in the coral ground! |
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| Alka and Kanma planting coconut trees |
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| Kanma getting water from the well |
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| Watering trees |
Now, we (volunteers) can't take all the credit for getting the marine centre to where it is. Most of the really hard work is done by a couple of local guys. One guy in particular is quite cool - Riffa. He's from Bangladesh and speaks only a little English and even less Dhevehi. Our conversations are limited but we still manage to laugh a lot! |
| Riffa |
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| Inside of the marine centre painted |
And I've already mentioned that we do beach clean ups. We've had more people join us each week. Last Sunday we had about 8-10 locals come along and we cleaned up a huge stretch of beautiful beach. It was great to get so much done - I originally thought it would take us weeks to finish that section.
I'm recording (roughly) how much rubbish is collected each clean up. It would be really interesting to sort through it and see the relative proportions of each type of rubbish - plastic, tyres, glass, clothing, fishing lines etc but have not had time yet. For now, we will clean it up and look at gathering more data later.
Next week we have 14 students arriving from Dubai to work in the marine and waste management programmes (so many people here now, it's fantastic!) I've got a couple of talks to prepare to give to them and we will be taking them out and doing a lot of practical activities. I'll update you next time on what we get up to!
I'm so enjoying getting stuck into both the theoretical and practical sides of this programme. There is so much to do and I've found that by simply taking small steps towards a goal each day, it hasn't taken long to see real progress being made! So exciting!
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| Alka with Asfaru |
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