From the 27th June until the 5th September I was volunteering with ARCHELON, the Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece. I found this opportunity through GVI, Global Vision International. When applying to become a volunteer you could choose from a variety of dates throughout the summer in 2-week intervals, you could volunteer anywhere from 2-weeks to 12-weeks. ARCHELON itself was founded in 1983 and they have several conservation projects in Greece; in Zakynthos, Koroni, Crete and Kyparissia as well as Lakonikos Bay. In Lakonikos Bay, where I was, the project monitored and protected sea turtle nests on 4 beaches; Mavrovouni, Selinitsa, Valtaki and Vathi. I spent my first day getting to know the other volunteers who had both just arrived and those of who had been volunteering for 2-weeks already.
Each Sunday our rota for the week was prepared. My first day volunteering on Sunday 28th consisted of a morning survey on Mavrovouni.
Mavrovouni
Morning surveys began at 5:30am and were where we walked the full length of the beach at the shore looking for any mother Caretta caretta (The endangered Loggerhead Sea Turtle) tracks from during the night. The mother turtles would make any nesting attempts during the night so we walked the beach at first light so if a nest was laid we could build the protection before dogs or foxes predated the nest or people walked over the nest damaging the eggs. Also going earlier meant that the turtle tracks would be intact not faded from wind or people walking over them.
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Turtle tracks.
We recorded all the attempts in a morning survey book for each beach to keep a record of the activity. Later that day I had a beach clean on Vathi, picking up all the rubbish on the beach, especially fishing nets and plastic bags. Plastic bags can confuse turtles and they think they are jellyfish so try to eat them. This is why beach cleans were so important, they are also a great way to raise public awareness!.
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.I had my first kiosk shift the following day from 10:00-13:00, the shift consisted of counting our stock, informing the public to our volunteering efforts, about the sea turtles on the beach and how they could help. Our kiosk is stationed on Mavrovouni beach so a lot of beach goers would see the nests and became curious as to what we do. Or you'd meet locals who had no idea sea turtles even came up onto the beach to nest, which would prove how essential public awareness is..
Our kiosk on Mavrovouni Beach by Joni Stamoulis
The following day I had Morning survey again and also basecamp. Basecamp was just doing the errands around camp, help clean up the area. Every day there were 2 basecamp shifts, from 12:00-15:00 and the other at 18:00-21:00. On average there were 15 volunteers staying at camp so it could get messy if not maintained each day. Similarly each of us had alternating shifts in cooking for camp, if enough people were at camp 2 people had that shift in a day, but not always.
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On Saturday 4th July I had my first morning surveys on Valtaki and Selinitsa. At the beginning of my volunteering morning surveys were split in doing either the whole of Mavrovouni (5km length beach) or Valtaki and Selinitsa combined as they are shorter beaches..
Valtaki
Selinitsa
Those beaches we had to drive to, unlike Mavrovouni which was a 5-minute waking distance, if that. We started on Selinista, and this is the day I found my very first nest. I had seen turtle tracks before on previous surveys but this was my first nest. When the turtle nesting attempt was identified as a nest we dug for the eggs, we would dig for the top egg of the egg chamber and once found measurements would be taken..
S011 before necessary nest protection & digging took place.
S011's top egg in the egg chamber!
Each nest was given a unique nest code so they could be easily identified on surveys. My first nest was S011!.
Me and my first nest on Selinitsa S011.
Summary:
27/06- Arrived!
28/06- MS M / Beach Clean B
29/06- K 10:00-13:00
30/06- MS M / Induction 16:00 / BC 18:00-21:00
01/07- Day Off
02/07- MS M / cook
03/07- K 10:00-13:00
04/07- MS V+S / BC 12:00-15:00.
Key:
MS- Morning Survey
ES- Evening Survey
LS- Light Survey
NP- Night Patrol
K- Kiosk
BC- Basecamp
IT- Information Table
SS- Slideshow
EX- Excavation
SH- Shading.
Beach Codes:
M- Mavrovouni (Whole beach)
ME- Mavrovouni East
MW- Mavrovouni West
V- Valtaki
S- Selinitsa
B- Vathi.
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