The baby Olive Ridley turtles at the Rushikulya beach. Telegraph picture

Berhampur, April 22: The Olive Ridley turtles have begun hatching eggs at Rushikulya rookery in Ganjam. Favourable weather conditions at the nesting site are helping the baby turtles emerge from their eggs, sources said.

“Thousands of baby Olive Ridley turtles have been crawling into the sea after emerging from their eggs since Wednesday. A total of 2.52 lakh turtles laid their eggs over a stretch of 4km of beach land at Gokharkuda from March 3 to 10,” said Rabindranath Sahu, secretary of the Rushikulya Sea Turtle Protection Committee, Purunabandha.

“A female Olive Ridley lays 80 to 200 eggs and around 80 hatchlings come out of each nest. These eggs are incubated and hatched due to sand heat. Then the baby turtles emerge from their eggs and creep into the sea with the help of their flippers. The process may continue for one week,” Sahu said.

Officials of the wildlife wing of forest department, volunteers of Rushikulya Sea Turtles Protection Committee and villagers of Purunabandha, Gokharakuda and Kantiagada have been taking extra care to minimise damage to the eggs.

K.K. Nayak, forest ranger, Khallikote, said: “We have put up a 7ft fencing on the stretch where nesting was taking place. The plastic net will remain there until hatching is over. It will help the baby turtles not to move away from the sea.”

A few years ago, Operation Kachhap, a project funded by the San Francisco-based Barbara Delano Foundation, had set up a 2ft net over one kilometre stretch at the nesting site to check movement of the hatched baby turtles. Many hatchlings died while moving towards the land owing to disorientation caused by light from the nearby towns and headlights of vehicles plying on the NH-5 that is 4km from the nesting site, sources said.

Every year, from November to May, the forest department takes measures for the smooth congregation, mating, nesting, hatching of eggs and safety of the baby turtles. “We take all possible steps to protect the nests and the eggs from predators such as, dogs, foxes, crows and vultures,” said Berhampur divisional forest officer Ajaya Kumar Jena, who is supervising and monitoring the process. Scientists of the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), the Indian Science Academy, local people and NGO activists had also helped regarding this, he said.

Although the Olive Ridley turtle was declared an endangered species under the Wildlife Act 1972, Rushikulya rookery, the second largest of its kind in the world after Gahiramatha, was discovered in 1994. It is located along the southern Orissa coast of Ganjam district and spreads over 4km from Purunabandha to Kantiagada village. The nesting beach is more or less flat with scattered sand dunes that are one to two metres high. The average beach width is about 100 metres from near the high tide line, though at some places the width is more than this.