Protecting Sea Turtles to Promote Eco-tourism

We've officially launched our sea turtle program in the Rivas province, and La Prensa picked it up to share the story with the rest of Nicaragua.

The campaign, designed to protect critically endangered sea turtles who nest on the beaches of Nicaragua, include environmental education, water conservation, eco-tourism, and local development. It also includes a sea turtle incentive payment program described by country director Liza González:

Es un programa de incentivos. Si hay un comunitario que normalmente se llevaba los huevos de ese nido, entonces el programa va a apoyarlo, si él quiere proteger ese nido va a recibir un incentivo por protección, ese incentivo es equivalente a lo que él ganaría si vendiera los huevos.

The sea turtle payment program offers financial incentives for communities, where turtle eggs were often harvested (or poached) before they hatched, to protect the turtle nests. We pay individuals and make community grants for every protected nest and every turtle hatchling who makes it to the sea.

To support this program, buy one of our sea turtle shower timers, designed to remind you of a very good reason to conserve water.

A Small Place on Planet Earth

Over at the Cantur San Juan del Sur blog, they're helping us gear up for Earth Day, by advertising our first ever Earth Day Forum.

We'll be in San Juan del Sur, "a small place on this wonderful planet Earth, endowed with exceptional and endless beauty" April 22nd and 23rd, making it Nicaragua's Earth Day headquarters.

The goal of the event is to celebrate the natural beauty of the region and to remind people that our economic growth as a tourist destination depends on the conservation of its natural heritage.

Supporting us in this endeavor are the following organizations and agencies:

• the Rural Community Tourism Association of Miravalle (ATRUCOM)
• the Municipal Tourism Commission (Coture)
• Cantur San Juan del Sur
• Community Tours Ostional
• the Environmental Unit Municipality of San Juan del Sur

Saving Yellow-naped Amazon Parrots in Nicaragua

Our parrot video is now available in English!

Lora Nuca Amarillo

Please watch our video addressing the issue of poaching parrots in Nicaragua.

Once abundant in tropical forests, the Yellow-naped parrot (Lora Nuca Amarillo in Spanish) is increasingly rare in Nicaragua, where habitat destruction and poaching have reduced its numbers rapidly.



Poachers are often young rural farmers who climb over 15 meters into trees or chop down trees to take parrot chicks out of their nests. Yellow-naped parrots only have one clutch per year (usually just one to three eggs), and are monogamous, so if they lose their mate, they are out of luck for the rest of their lives.

In addition to environmental education which helps children understand the importance of the species they share the forest with, we're currently caring for orphan parrot fledglings. These parrots were confiscated by the army near the border of Costa Rica, where the poachers were presumably taking them to sell. We are advising the army on the care of the parrot chicks until the Ministry of Environment authorities decide what to do about them.

Gracias, Ostional!

We're so pleased with the level of involvement at our community meeting in Ostional, where we have launched an initiative which includes environmental education, a sea turtle incentive payment program, and kayak guides to take eco-tourists through the mangroves.

Community Tourism at the feria.

The Ostional community guides spent the weekend at Las Galerias Mall in Managua to share their story and to promote Ostional as a tourism destination. Guided tours range from bird-watching hikes, to sea-kayaking trips. All guides (first four young women on the left) are young members of the local community. They are proud to know that they will benefit from ecological tourism.

Coral Reefs: Cradles of Evolution

January's Science roundup included interesting work on coral reefs:

Compiling geological and biological data from fossils, a team of evolutionary scientists has found indications of the following:

• reefs are important evolutionary cradles independent of their preferred habitat in shallow, tropical environments
• in nonreefal ecosystems, shallow-water environments represent the most important evolutionary cradles

Understanding reefs will help us understand populations of sea turtles and other marine wildlife as reefs face the threats of pollution and climate change.