As a boy Austin Freeman went with his grandfather to kill leatherback turtles for meat and oil.
“When trunk season come it had me excited. Even if we don’t catch, I still felt good because I just liked to see them,” Mr. Freeman said. “It fascinated me.”
Nowadays Mr. Freeman, a senior BVI Customs officer who is almost 50, spends his free time recording and protecting the endangered animals that nest along the shores of Tortola.
Although he has been a volunteer with the Conservation and Fisheries Department for more than 20 years, he still struggles to convince some people that he is protecting the leatherbacks and not harming them.
According to Mr. Freeman, leatherback hunting was a “tradition” in the Virgin Islands, but it is now fading away with hunters like Mr. Freeman’s grandfather, who died in the 1970s.
In 1989 a moratorium on killing the leatherbacks was put into effect by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Labour. Around the same time, Mr. Freeman started volunteering with the CFD, tagging nesting leatherbacks.
Currently only three people — Mr. Freeman and CFD officers Joel Dore and Gary Frett — tag the leatherbacks, according to Mr. Dore. The three men monitor Tortola’s north shore on a regular basis during nesting season.
See the July 26, 2012 edition for full coverage.
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