Sea turtle populations are under pressure on a global scale due to anthropogenic causes which has led some populations and species to be critically endangered with extinction. One of those species is the hawksbill sea turtle. A resident in both the Atlantic and Indo-Pacific Ocean, this species still occupies some strongholds with the Seychelles archipelago being one of them. In order to optimize our understanding of the hatching success of this population, a study was done on the island of Mahé on six different nesting beaches. Data was collected by surveying the nesting beaches at specific set dates to find and tag turtle nests in order to collect the data after the nests had hatched. Both biotic and abiotic parameters that could have an influence on the hatching success, being (1) nest chamber depth, (2) rainfall, (3) vegetation and (4) predation were studied over a period of four consecutive nesting seasons (2015-2019) to try to understand the relation between these parameters and the hatching success. In total, 239 nests were examined. Our results show that the hatching success on Mahé is high with an overall average of 91.3%. This was stable over the different nesting seasons with low variation between the different nesting beaches. Nest chamber depth, vegetation and precipitation did not seem to have an effect on the hatching success. The only factor that did explain the variation in hatching success was the predation by ghost crabs (Ocypode spp.).
Managing Thesis and Internship Exchanges
