A turtle sighting on a Nayarit beach takes everyone by surprise

A group of vacationers was standing near a handicrafts stand when they spotted a few baby turtles ambling around. Six out of the eight species of turtles in the world do their egg-laying in Mexico.

A turtle sighting on a Nayarit beach takes everyone by surprise
Beachgoers in Nayarit are taken by surprise by turtles. Photo by Randall Ruiz / Unsplash

Tourists enjoying the beach in the area of Nuevo Vallarta, in the state of Nayarit, were surprised when they noticed that a few meters away from them, small turtles were walking along the side of a handicraft stand.

And what did they do?-"We started to see something moving next to us and when we got closer we realized that the turtles were hatching. We decided to go look for the lifeguard so he could tell us what the protocol to follow was when this happened, "said one of the tourists named Jessy."

It should be noted that when these turtles leave the nest and seek to reach the sea with daylight, they become prey to some predatory animals that easily capture them, so these tourists organized themselves to prevent them from being affected while they were lost in the seawater.

"We started to see a line of little black things moving and, yes, there were more than 100 little turtles and they all came out of their shells because we were just kind of scratching to help them come out and we only found the shells already empty," added Estefany, who was spending her free time on the beach.

The arrival of turtles to the beaches of the Mexican Pacific to lay their eggs begins in August and ends in December.

Mexico has the greatest diversity of sea turtles in the world. Of the seven species that exist worldwide, six choose the Mexican Republic to lay their eggs. warm beaches such as those of the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Caribbean. The species of sea turtles found in Mexico are loggerhead, hawksbill, green turtle, olive ridley, olive ridley, and leatherback turtles.

Nayarit's turtles are a pleasant surprise for vacationers.
Nayarit's turtles are a pleasant surprise for vacationers.

Unfortunately, these species are listed in the category of "Endangered" by the Secretary of the Navy, which is why the Operational Program for the Protection of Sea Turtles was implemented, recovering 102,753 eggs illegally extracted from Mexican beaches and safeguarding 1.8 million baby turtles captured for sale.