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HOW JELLIESCAN HELP US FIND TURTLES
NIGEL EATON, EDITOR
WHY WOULD YOU WANT TO SPEND TIME on your UK dives this summer keeping track of underwater encounters with jellyfish?
Most divers know that jellyfish are a favourite food of sea turtles, but few of us are aware that the latter are regularly seen in UK coastal waters. Now an initiative is under way based on the idea that by compiling information on where jellyfish occur, we will be able better to predict where feeding turtles are likely to be seen when they visit us.
Launched last year by the Marine Conservation Society ( MCS), the National Jellyfish Survey complements the established Turtle Watch programme. The aim is to build a picture of the seasonal and geographic distribution of both turtles and jellyfish by keeping a record of dives on which individual jellyfish and jellyfish swarms are seen (and also reporting when they are not seen).
Which turtles are known to venture into UK waters? Five of the world's seven species - the leatherback, loggerhead, Kemp's Ridley, green and hawksbill - have so far been recorded. For most, a stopover in our chilly seas is not thought to be part of their normal life history. They turn up here only because they have got lost or been blown off course by unusual weather conditions.
In the case of the largest sea turtle species, however, the story is different. Growing up to 2.9m long, and able to tolerate cooler conditions, leatherbacks are known to visit the UK to feed - and it is about these giants that more data is sought.
Experience suggests that reporting can work well. Last year's publication by the MCS of its Basking Shark Watch Report, for instance, drew on records of thousands of personal encounters from divers and other sea-users submitted since 1987. Its findings have enabled us to pinpoint basking shark hotspots, such as Devon, Cornwall, the Isle of Man and west Scotland, and to get a good idea of when in the diving calendar these gentle plankton-feeders will turn up.
Meanwhile, the message for 2004 is that we could be in for a bumper season for striking marine-life encounters.
"An incredible sighting of 70 adult basking sharks three miles north of Guernsey, as well as early leatherback turtle sightings in Cornwall, suggests that 2004 will be a great year for spotting spectactular marine wildlife in our seas," says Joanna Doyle, Biodiversity Projects Manager at the MCS.
Copies of the MCS Basking Shark Watch recording cards, MCS Jellyfish Guide, and UK Turtle Code can be obtained from the MCS by calling 01989 566017.
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