Celebrating the World Sea Turtles Day on the Kilifi Coast

Thomas Sagimo
2 days ago
3 min read

Introduction
Partnership in Action: Ocean Sole and SEE Turtles
Nyota ya Asubui: Teaching Young Guardians on the Beach.
How You Can Help

Introduction

Every nesting season, females' sea turtles emerge from the darkness of the Indian Ocean and crawl up the beaches of the Kilifi Coast to lay their eggs, an ancient ritual that has played out for over 100 million years. At Ocean Sole we have made it our mission to ensure it continues.

Photo: Sea hatchlings crawling back to the sea.

Our sea turtle programme centres on beach-based nest monitoring tracking programme centres on beach-based nest monitoring tracking nests, protecting clutches from predation, and recording every emergence we can. But our work does not stop at the waterline. We believe that the future of sea turtles on this coast depends not just on what happens on the beach at night, but on the people who live, work, and grow up beside the ocean every single day.

Photo: Kwa Chambo Fishermen protecting sea turtles along the Kilifi beach.

World Sea Turtle Day celebrated every year on the 16th of June is our reminder of why that story must be told louder, shared wider and lived more deeply. This year, we marked it in the best way we know how, by taking action together.

Partnership in Action: Ocean Sole and SEE Turtles

SEE Turtle is an international conservation organisation with a powerful model, they connect travellers and volunteers from around the world with frontline sea turtle conservation efforts, channelling energy of global citizen into tangible impact.

Together Ocean Sole and Sea Turtle took to the beach for a collaborative beach clean, targeting one of the key stretches of coastline where sea turtles' nest. We collected plastic waste, discarded fishing line and waste that poses a deadly hazard to nesting females and hatchlings making their first scramble to the sea.

Photo:SEE Turtle Visitors participating on a beach clean with the Ocean Sole Mamaz.

There is something deeply moving about standing on turtle nesting beach with people who have standing on turtles nesting beach with people who have travelled across the world because they care. It is proof that the turtles of Kilifi are not only our responsibility they belong to a global family of people who refuse to look away.

This is what international solidarity for ocean conservation look like. And it happened right here on our shore.

Nyota ya Asubui: Teaching Young Guardians on the Beach.

No conservation movement survives without its next generation. On world Sea Turtle Day, we were reminded of the truth in the most beautiful way.

We partnered with the students of Nyota ya Asubui bright, curious and full of energy for a special beach session dedicated entirely to them. We brought the classroom to the coastline.

Photo: Sally teaching kids concerning plastic waste and the effects on sea turtles.

We opened with education, introducing the students to the fascinating world of sea turtles. We shared how these ancient animals navigate vast stretches of open ocean, how females return sometimes after decades to the exact beach where they were born to lay their own eggs. We talked about the threats they face, plastic pollution, habitat loss, accidental capture. And we talked about what each one of us can do.

Then we acted on it. Together with the students of Nyota, ya Asubui we collected 18.75kgs of waste at the same beach where sea turtle come to nest. Every piece of plastic they picked up was direct act of protection for an animal they just learned to care about.

Photo: Kids from Nyota ya Asubui weighing waste that they have collected during the beach clean.

World Sea Turtle Day is a celebration but it also a call. A call to show up for the animals who cannot advocate for themselves. A call to build bridges between communities between generations and between local action and global movement.