Panama City, Oct. 12 — Hundreds of turtles lay their eggs every year on beaches along Panama’s Pacific coast but their hatchlings face numerous threats to survival, both at sea and from stray dogs and poachers.

All along the coast of the small Punta Chame peninsula in central Panama, about 100 kilometers (62 miles) southwest of this capital, stray dogs roam and prey on the eggs that endangered olive ridley sea turtles lay in nests dug into the dry sand.

Gerardo Alvarez, a biologist and project coordinator for the Tortuguias Foundation, told EFE that his team has had to monitor the coast at night and relocate eggs in fenced-in nurseries to keep them safe from predators.

“This dog predation scenario has spread all over the world. Many don’t have an owner and eggs are the easiest way for them to cover their nutritional needs, while they also attack adult turtles and partially devour them,” the marine wildlife expert said.

Last year, dogs killed eight adult turtles during the nesting process, Tortuguias says.

The foundation therefore works with the Punta Chame local government and the Spay Panama non-governmental organization to sterilize and rescue dogs so they can find homes and no longer pose a threat to turtle eggs.

Turtles also are under threat from local residents who steal the eggs for daily consumption and from poachers, who illegally sell that product and defend the practice on customary grounds.

“The eggs are used as an aphrodisiac because of the belief they increase sexual potency, and local residents eat them for breakfast, but this practice is unsustainable,” Kerya Hernandez, president of the Tortuguias Foundation, told EFE.

She said the foundation has released more than 75,000 hatchlings in six years, only 1 of every 1,000 – the biologists say – reaches maturity and returns to the beach of its birth to nest.

The two activists say Panama, which has more than 200 sea turtle nesting beaches, needs to more effectively enforce laws against harming the ecosystem.

The reality, however, is that turtle egg thefts are increasingly frequent and those crimes typically go unpunished. EFE