Chelonia Green, Champion of Turtles

by Christobel Mattingley

  From late November through the summer, Chellie went out each evening with her parents to look for nesting turtles. No torches, no talking. Home Beach was the turtles’ favourite because of its soft deep sand. They liked high tide and seemed to prefer a full moon or a new moon. Chellie loved wandering along in the moonlight, listening to the lapping of the waves, watching for a dark shape to emerge from the water.

  Sometimes, even though they stood still and silent, the turtle seemed to sense they were there and would turn and lumber back into the water. But usually she continued on her heavy way until she found a place for her precious burden of eggs. Chellie could hear the scrape scrape scrape as, with all four flippers working steadily, the turtle would send loose sand flying to clear a pit for her body. Half an hour it usually took, with the Southern Cross moving slowly slowly in the deep blue above.

  Then she might pause a little before starting to dig a deep egg chamber with her hind flippers. That took at least another quarter of an hour. Nearly an hour of silent watching since the turtle had left the water. But although Chellie had seen it many times now, she grew so absorbed in the wonder of it, that she didn’t feel the pins and needles in her legs.

  Dad might shine a carefully shaded torch, just for a moment, and Chellie would catch her breath at the gleam of eggs like ping-pong balls dropping into their chamber. Minutes later it was over, and the sand would fly again as the turtle began covering her nest. This could take as long as it had to dig it and Chellie counted stars again – the Southern Cross and the Saucepan, which Dad called Orion’s Belt. But she could never even begin to count the myriad myriad twinkles in the Milky Way.

  The moon rode higher and higher in the mysterious night sky. At last the mother turtle was satisfied she had done her best. She lumbered back down the beach to the welcoming water, leaving her eggs to hatch by themselves six weeks later in the warmth of the sand.

  Chellie let out a sigh as the dark shape disappeared into the sea, and she wondered if she would ever see it again. Turtles do come back to the same beach to nest all through their long lives, she knew. But they don’t breed every year, so it could be two or five or even eight years before this green turtle returned. She might be setting off on a migration back to her usual feeding grounds, which could be up to 3000 kilometres away in the Pacific Ocean. Chellie felt dazed, amazed, astonished that a creature which could be as old as her grandma, even as her great-grandma, could still produce babies, and still swim all that way. Turtles truly are awesome creatures, she decided.

  She stumbled a bit as they walked back, so Mum and Dad gave her a chairlift home. Then it was time for a warm Milo and a biscuit before Mum tucked her into bed. After turtle-watching nights, Chellie dreamed watery green turtle dreams and woke late. Lucky that nesting time was during school holidays.

  CHAPTER 5

  Hatching!

  EVEN MORE EXCITING THAN WATCHING the mother turtles lay eggs was watching the baby turtles emerge. Dad and Chellie kept a record of all the nests and the dates they had been made, so they had a good idea when and where to look for hatchlings.

  Chellie had read that breaking through the leathery shell took a baby turtle up to twenty-four hours. The baby had to uncurl and straighten out and eat the rest of its egg yolk to give it strength to climb up to the surface. The little turtles waited until all were ready to make the big push up through the sand, breathing air between the grains as they climbed. That marathon could take several days.

  As if they sensed there was safety in numbers, one hundred and more broke through the surface together, usually at night. Chellie loved the sight of them hurrying, scurrying across the sand, flippers moving like dog paddle, down towards the sea they had never seen. They were so tiny. So cute. She longed to pick them up and help them on their way. Their little shells were smaller than the palm of her hand. It was hard to imagine that they could grow into something as large and as heavy as The Dowager.

  Sadly, most of them probably never would. The rush down the beach was only the first of many dangers the young turtles faced. Once they reached the water they were in a cold harsh world where they were easy prey for sharks, fish and diving birds. Perhaps one in a thousand might survive all the hazards to return thirty years later as an adult.

  ‘Go, little turtles, go!’ Chellie breathed. ‘Stay safe, stay strong, grow, grow, grow. And come back again. Please do!’

  CHAPTER 6

  Caretta

  AFTER THE LATEST HATCHING, the sun was well up when Chellie woke. She jumped out of bed and hastily pulled on shorts and top, determined not to waste another moment of the beautiful blue day. Dad and Mum had already had breakfast. Chellie could hear the sound of the tractor over near the dam and could see Mum’s big sun hat bobbing among the tomato bushes. She chomped through her muesli, downed her milk and ran out into the hot January morning.

  Waving to her mother, she called over her shoulder, ‘Tide’s right for Turtle Point. See ya!’

  She raced towards the track, singing a song to encourage the hatchlings as she ran. ‘Sharks stay away, today and every day, from the baby turtles out in the bay. Noddies and boobies stay away, today and every day, from the baby turtles out in the bay. Hungry fish stay away, today and every day, from the baby turtles out in the bay.’

  Over the hummocks she panted, pausing at last for breath on the sandhill. She never grew tired of that special moment when she looked down on the shining expanse of sand and sea that was Turtle Beach. So strong, so wild, so free. Chellie felt a thrill every time.

  But today the thrill turned to chill. She shivered. Her heart seemed to drop into her guts like a big black lump. Like the big black lump dumped by the receding tide, a blot on the mirror-bright sand.

  A great knot of seaweed? A hunk of wood?

  Not a turtle, Chellie told herself. A turtle wouldn’t come ashore on a falling tide in bright sunlight. They rarely nested here anyway, because the sand was so hard. And there were no tracks leading down from the narrow strip of soft sand above high-tide mark.

  A couple of circling gulls swooped in and began to peck at the still, dark form.

  ‘No! No!’ Chellie shouted, waving her arms frantically.

  She flung herself down the slope, heedless of hidden hollows, scratching bushes and sly, long runners of marram grass waiting to trip her and send her tumbling. She pushed through the rattling pandanus and jumped off the bank down to the beach.

  More gulls had joined the first two. Chellie felt the muesli and milk rising in her throat as she ran towards the water’s edge. It can’t be a turtle. It mustn’t be a turtle.

  But it was.

  A big brown turtle. A loggerhead.

  ‘Caretta!’ Chellie sobbed.

  The gulls took wing, protesting raucously that she had disturbed them before they could begin to feed.

  Chellie knelt down beside the big creature. She had never touched Caretta before. Not even when she lay dreaming in her own peaceful rock pool. Now Chellie stroked the red-brown shell and lifted the lifeless flippers gently. She stared in horror at Caretta’s sturdy head, enmeshed in a cruel snarl of silvery fishing line. Fishing line which the turtle must have mistaken for a jellyfish. Fishing line which had choked her. Choked her to death.

  The dark eyes that had watched Chellie so many times without fear were dulled. They would never again see the cool green sea light, the shining flash of fish, the wonders of the coral reefs. Those powerful flippers would never again make the long swim to distant Pacific cays. They would never excavate another nesting chamber.

  Although the sun was burning the back of her neck and knees, Chellie was cold inside. Cold cold cold. Caretta might have lived another fifty years. Or more. But now she was dead. Dead dead dead.

  Tense and stiff, Chellie got to her feet. And began to run. Stumbling at first, then loping more easily up to the bank, pulling herself up, pushing past the pandanus trees, puffing up the hill, then running running running towards the sound of the tractor.

&n
bsp; ‘Dad!’ she screamed, long before he could hear her. ‘Dad!’

  But he saw her and switched off the engine. He jumped down and ran towards her.

  ‘Caretta’s dead!’ she wailed, flinging herself into his arms.

  CHAPTER 7

  The Challenge

  DAD GATHERED CHELLIE UP AS if she was a three-year-old again, and set off back the way she had come. She could feel his strong heart beating and his sweat trickling onto her.

  He set her down at the top of the sandhills. Together they looked to the beach. The seagulls had returned. Chellie shivered again. Dad took her hand and together they slithered down. She could taste Dad’s sweat and her own tears salty on her tongue.

  Dad squeezed her hand as they stood silently looking at Caretta. ‘She’s dead all right,’ he said quietly. ‘Done for by that discarded fishing line. Careless beggars fishermen can be sometimes. Don’t stop to think before they toss stuff overboard, treating the sea as if it’s a garbage tip. And turtles are so vulnerable. Can’t tell the difference between fishing line or a plastic bag and a nice juicy jellyfish.’

  Chellie felt a surge of anger and a wave of despair.

  ‘Loggerheads are endangered !’ she wailed. ‘And Caretta hasn’t even laid her eggs yet. At least, we haven’t seen any of her tracks.’

  ‘She may have started, laid at least one clutch somewhere,’ Dad tried to comfort her.

  But the tears rolled down Chellie’s cheeks. ‘Caretta could have laid six clutches this season. She could have had 750 babies. And one might have survived.’

  They stood a few more long minutes looking at the victim of someone’s carelessness.

  ‘Shall we bury her, Dad?’

  ‘No, Chellie. The sea will take care of its own. Nature will see to that.’

  ‘I don’t want the gulls eating her. Or the crabs.’ Chellie glared up at the wheeling gulls shrieking overhead.

  ‘Gulls are scavengers,’ Dad reminded her. ‘They do a good job cleaning up.’

  Chellie shuddered. ‘Can we take a photo of her, Dad? I’ll run home for the camera.’

  ‘Good idea,’ Dad agreed. ‘We can send it to the turtle research people.’

  But just as she turned to set off , Mum’s hat appeared on the skyline. Then Mum appeared.

  ‘I’ve brought the camera,’ she shouted. ‘When I saw you both tear off , I thought it might be something you could want to photograph.’ She held out the camera and looked down at the turtle which would never go to sea again. ‘Sadly I was right.’

  Chellie flung herself into her mother’s arms. ‘Mum, it’s Caretta. And loggerheads are endangered.’

  Mum held her tight as she sobbed.

  After a moment she pulled away and knelt down at Caretta’s head. ‘Look at this, Mum. She didn’t have a chance.’

  Dad took a close-up shot of the vicious tangle of fishing line and one of Chellie kneeling beside the dead loggerhead. ‘See if you can find a couple of metres of rope or twine up in the sea wrack, and we’ll measure her. She doesn’t have a tag, so she’s not on the research record.’

  It didn’t take Chellie long to find what Dad had asked for among the seaweed beyond the high-tide mark. Usually she liked combing through all the things that the sea had washed up: a fishing float that Dad could use at the mooring; a long, striped cushion which Mum put on the bench by the back door. Chellie had found coathangers, combs, clothes pegs, and even ballpoint pens that still worked. Once she found a big plastic crate, which Dad took to store things in the shed. Another time she found a perfectly good chopping board, which Mum was pleased to have. A plastic rake head, a paint brush, a broom head, some big plant pots, a swim flipper, a ball and a towel were all treasure trove. She once carried home a bike seat even though she didn’t have a bike, and once a square of blue carpet, which Mum laid beside her bed.

  But now suddenly she was aware, as never before, of all the lengths of frayed and knotted rope, the ragged swatches of netting, the long strips of vicious plastic binding, the tangles of fishing line – vicious vicious fishing line – and the plastic lures with lethal hooks and barbs. Plastic bags galore. And bottles. Dozens and dozens of plastic bottles: soft drink, sauce, shampoo, detergent. Even poison. Chellie’s anger flared again. How could people throw poison bottles into the sea?

  As Chellie raced back to Dad with the rope for measuring Caretta, she vowed that in future she would pick up every single piece of rubbish that found its way onto the island beaches. Every single piece.

  CHAPTER 8

  Storm

  DOWN ON THE SOUTHERN HORIZON dark clouds were forming, moving fast, blotting out the blue sky with sombre grey. Chellie and Dad measured Caretta.

  ‘She’s over a metre,’ Dad calculated. ‘Probably fully grown. A beautiful specimen.’

  Chellie nodded, swallowing her tears.

  Dad looked up at the rapidly advancing clouds. ‘We’d better start moving. They’ll be dumping on us before we get home.’

  Back up the sandhills. Back through the bush, where the birds had gone quiet. Along the sandy track, where ants were hurrying with little white eggs. Then the first heavy drops of rain. Slow and soft at first, but becoming thicker, faster, harder, heavier. By the time they reached the porch it was pelting down, gurgling through the gutters into the thirsty tanks.

  Chellie’s hair hung in dripping strands. Mum’s sunhat drooped wetly over her face. Dad was clutching the camera inside his shirt. Chellie peeled off her sodden top and kicked off her squelchy shoes.

  Mum hugged her. ‘Let’s get lunch.’

  She made Chellie’s favourite salad sandwiches and Chellie squeezed limes for a big jug of squash, which was so refreshing on a hot day.

  After lunch, while the casuarinas wept in the rain, Dad and Chellie worked at the computer, writing their report to the turtle research people.

  ‘They’ll need to know her measurements, where we found her and what caused her death,’ Dad said.

  Chellie keyed in Caretta’s length and the measurement at the broadest point of her carapace, thinking of her as a hatchling on a summer night – a tiny determined speck of life, heading by instinct to her future home, the sea. It had taken Caretta thirty years or more to grow to this size. She was probably more than three times as old as Chellie. She had known a world Chellie could never know. Those heavy-lidded eyes, which exuded tears to cleanse her body from the salt in the water she drank, would never weep again. But Chellie would.

  Dad suggested they put in the longitude and latitude of their island and describe Turtle Beach’s position. Then the cause of death. Chellie felt as if the vicious fishing line was caught in her own mouth: cutting, choking, stifling her breathing. Dad patted her on the back.

  ‘Now we’ll put in our names and the date. And then we can attach the photos. Lucky we splurged on that digital camera at Christmas. Let’s hope the phone connection is working and we can get our email away.’

  The rain eased, and after tea Mum and Dad decided to go looking for a nest that was due to send forth its hatchlings. ‘Coming?’ they asked Chellie.

  Chellie shook her head, ‘Not tonight.’

  She just didn’t have the heart. It was all very well to write that report to the research people, but measurements and latitudes did not express how she felt about Caretta. After her parents had left, she took out her pad and wrote at the top of a new sheet – Caretta’s Cruel Death.

  The pain and anger flowed from the tip of her ballpoint across the page. She wrote and wrote, seeing Caretta lying peacefully in her rock pool, seeing her like a ballet dancer in the clear sunlit depths of the sea. Seeing her lifeless on the beach. Choked and starved to death. Seeing a fisherman cutting away a length of line tangled by his carelessness, tossing it overboard as if the sea was just a garbage tip. Seeing all the plastic and rope and twine littering beaches that had been pristine.

  At last she had written out her heart’s burden. She laid down her pen and put the sheets into her folder. Mum and
Dad were not back yet. She wished they were. The air felt still, heavy, ominous. A crackle of lightning flashed across the sky. She wished Mum and Dad would come home. Electrical storms often came in summer and it could be dangerous to be out in them.

  Chellie crept into bed, meaning to stay awake until her parents came in. But exhausted by all that had happened, she fell asleep.

  She woke with the curtains flapping in her face like demented ghosts. The wind was screeching and shrieking like the violins of a class of learners. The pandanus outside her window was rattling like a cacophony of castanets. In the distance she could hear the drum roll of surf on Turtle Beach. She groped for the light switch. Nothing happened. She grabbed her torch and shouted. ‘Mum! Dad!’

  But there was no answer.

  Where they still out in the storm?

  Chellie raced into her parents’ bedroom.

  ‘Are you all right, Chellie?’ they called.

  Chellie jumed onto the bed and burrowed between them. ‘I’m just so glad you’re home,’ she murmured.

  ‘The hatchlings made it to the water before all this blew up,’ Dad assured her.

  Chellie snuggled close. Home Beach was more sheltered, and they would not have had to front the big rollers which would have dumped them, stunned them, perhaps even suffocated them. She sighed with relief and fell asleep. The rain, the lightning, the thunder became part of a bad dream.

  CHAPTER 9

  Gone!

  IN THE MORNING MUM SURVEYED the battered sweet corn, yesterday so tall and proud. Dad tinkered with the generator. Only the birds were singing. Chellie ran through the swishing wet bush to the rain-pocked sandhills. The sea was calming now, as if its roaring and giant waves had only been part of her dream. But it had been no dream. Clots of foam as big and white as enamel camping plates were bowling along the beach. And the sand was littered with clumps of brown seaweed, like the dung of a vast herd of mythical seacows.