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The first turtle to be satellite tagged in the Turks and Caicos islands migrates over 3,400kms to the south Caribbean
Suzie, an adult female green turtle and first ever Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) turtle to be fitted with a satellite transmitter tag, has migrated over 3,400 kms since leaving TCI waters at the beginning of September. The satellite tag was fitted onto Suzie’s shell at the end of June by the Turks and Caicos Islands Turtle Project.
After release, Suzie spent a couple of months feeding off the coast of East Caicos before heading off on her epic migration. She hit the headlines in the UK when she visited three UK Overseas Territories in a row, including TCI, then the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and then Anguilla.
“Suzie’s journey is a remarkable first. She was the first turtle ever to be fitted with a satellite tag in the Turks and Caicos Islands, and her journey has told us for the first time that three of the UK Overseas Territories in the Caribbean, hundreds of kilometres apart, share green turtle populations,” said Peter Richardson, MCS Biodiversity Programme Manager. “We would never have predicted that she would visit three UK Territories in a row. She has revealed that each of these Territories has a responsibility to look after their shared turtle resource.”
Suzie spent less than a week in Anguillian waters before heading south to Barbuda. She stayed there for about another week and then carried on south to Martinique, her next ‘pit-stop’, where she stayed for a few more days before changing tack and heading west into the Caribbean Sea.
“Suzie was caught and named by fishermen in South Caicos, the home of fishing in TCI,“ said Wesley Clerveaux, Director of the Department of Environment and Coastal Resources in TCI. “Our project officers on the island are putting up the maps of Suzie’s journey on walls and notice boards each day and doing a great job of keeping the South Caicos locals informed. They are very interested and will stop our officers in the street to ask ‘Where Suzie at now?’”.
The project team have also satellite tagged four hawksbill turtles, with the tags funded by the People’s Trust for Endangered Species and the British Chelonia Group. The tags only transmit when the turtles surface to breath, and satellites orbiting in space receive the signals and calculate their locations. The Project can then track their movements remotely via the Internet using SEATURTLE.ORG's groundbreaking programme known as STAT. STAT communicates with the satellite system to plot online maps of the turtles' movements every day. Daily maps and pictures of Suzie and the other turtles can be viewed online by anyone around the world with Internet access.
“Suzie is still on the move and we do not know where she is going,” said Peter Richardson, “but anyone can access the daily maps and enjoy this amazing scientific discovery as it happens!”
Turks and Caicos Islands Turtle Project is a collaborative initiative between the Department of Environment and Coastal Resources (DECR) and the School for Field Studies (SFS) in TCI, the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) and the University of Exeter in the UK. The project is carrying out research into the turtle populations and turtle fishery in the Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI), and the satellite tagging work aims to reveal the full ranges of the turtle populations found there.
