(chill music)
- [Wes] This video of a sea turtle
with a plastic straw stuck in its nose
kick-started a global
movement to save the ocean.
- This is arguably the most
famous straw in the world.
- Yeah.
Now, four years later, the scientist
who removed that straw is onto something
he thinks could have
an even bigger impact.
(upbeat music)
My name is Wes Larson and
I'm a wildlife biologist.
Today I'm heading to the island
of Eleuthera in the Bahamas.
Tiny little airport here.
I've come all this way to learn about
the beautiful green sea turtle
from one of the world's leading experts.
Hey Nathan.
- It's a pleasure, how was your flight?
- Good, it's hot here.
- Yeah, that's what we get used
to down here in the Bahamas.
- [Wes] Nathan Robinson
is a sea turtle researcher
at the Cape Eleuthera Institute.
Here, Nathan and his team use something
called a TurtleCam to get a detailed look
at their behavior and environment.
- [Nathan] Understanding how a sea turtle
moves through its environment,
how it interacts with its
environment, is really important.
If we understand the food they need,
we understand what critical
habitats we can start to save,
these are the areas
that we need to protect
if we want to ensure
sea turtle populations
are surviving into the future.
- [Wes] Green sea turtles are endangered,
and are facing a number of threats
from climate change to ocean plastic.
To better understand those
threats we'll deploy a TurtleCam.
And for that we need a turtle.
- [Nathan] There he is.
- I think I'll be able to do it.
- [Nathan] Start warming
up those swimming muscles.
- [Wes] Give it my best shot,
hopefully I won't embarrass myself.
- [Nathan] And go.
(splashing)
- [Man] Go Wes!
(cheering)
- I wasn't even close.
- Sometimes the turtles win.
We call this turtle rodeo
for obvious reasons.
- [Wes] Believe it or not, the
safest and most efficient way
to catch a sea turtle is by hand.
And it's not easy.
- The first couple of people
are to just help tire them out.
- [Wes] The team has to take turns chasing
to wear the turtles down.
And before I can even catch my breath
it's time for another go.
(splashing)
- [Nathan] Yeah, woo!
The smaller they are the
faster they can swim.
He's getting closer, he's getting closer.
- [Man] Go Wes!
- [Nathan] The turtle's
ducking and weaving.
Lovely chasing.
There we go.
- Got him.
- Yeah!
(clapping)
That was fantastic.
His first ever turtle.
He chased a lot too.
Lovely stuff, Wes.
- This is pretty cool.
- His first turtle of the day.
(chill music)
We can actually get this turtle
transferred over to this boat.
- [Wes] Even though this turtle
is too small for a camera
the team can still get some data from it.
- [Nathan] There we go, 106.
- [Wes] Sea turtles breathe
air, just like we do,
so they're perfectly
fine out of the water.
But the team still works
as quickly as possible.
- They won't breathe continually as we do.
They'll breathe and hold their breath.
You'll see them lift up their head,
take a big gulp, and go back down.
- [Wes] The last step is to attach id tags
that will help the team monitor the turtle
for the rest of its life.
- It's like an ear piercing.
We try to be as quick and
efficient as possible.
So we have all the data we need.
They have their tags.
You have your first turtle.
So would you like to give it a release?
- I'd love to.
- Yeah?
- Yeah.
After the release, we're
right back on the chase boat.
We've only got a short amount of time
if we wanna deploy a TurtleCam today.
- There was a bigger guy that just went
the other way, Nathan.
- [Nathan] Big enough for our camera?
- [Woman] Yes.
- We saw a bigger turtle that
swam back into the creek,
so we're gonna turn around
and go chase that bigger one.
(calm music)
A few years ago, while
on a research expedition
funded by Texas A&M University,
Nathan had a life-changing experience.
- I was filmed removing a plastic straw,
actually this plastic straw,
from the nostril of a sea turtle.
And it ended up being a huge
aha moment in my career,
a huge turning point.
- [Wes] To date that video has been
viewed over 60 million times.
And led corporations like Starbucks
to announce that they're going
to phase out plastic straws.
- This one video got
the whole world inspired
to conduct a movement,
and now it's difficult
to go to most restaurants in
most countries of the world
and get plastic straws.
What I realized after this video
was if you create some media
that really engages
and shares that problem
with a global audience,
that has the potential
to enact real change.
And I think that's a perfect
goal for the TurtleCam project.
This is engaging footage that gets
people excited about these animals.
- [Man] I see him.
- [Wes] And then we spot the big one.
- [Nathan] Go.
(splashing)
Go Wes!
- [Wes] It's giving us a fight.
(chattering)
- [Nathan] Oh he's gone in the shallows.
- [Wes] But in turtle
rodeo persistence pays off.
- [Nathan] Oh, yes!
(clapping)
Two for two.
- Well done.
- All right.
- [Nathan] That's what we're after.
- Okay, I'm good on catching now.
- That's a perfect size.
Nice, dude.
Boom.
- Well done.
- We got a big one.
He didn't make it easy, but we got him.
- [Nathan] We got our TurtleCam turtle.
- Back on the big boat the
team kicks into high gear.
Installing a TurtleCam
is a bit of a process
and the goal is to do it
as quickly as possible
to avoid any unnecessary
stress on the turtle.
The really exciting part about this
is not knowing what you're gonna see.
The whole setup might look permanent
but the TurtleCam is designed to pop off
in a few hours, with the last traces
of the mounting points
gone in about a week.
(whooshing and gurgling)
(upbeat music)
- [Nathan] We have all these
initiatives around the world
to try and protect marine areas.
But if we don't know
which areas to protect
or what are the most
efficient areas to protect,
we won't be able to make good decisions.
And that's the kind of data that
we can get out of the TurtleCam footage.
- [Wes] Over the last year,
Nathan and the team have
recorded over 200 hours of
footage with the TurtleCams.
Soon enough, today's camera detaches,
and it's time to track it down.
(beeping)
- [Nathan] Woo hoo!
TurtleCam one retrieved.
Happy days.
- [Wes] With it safely aboard
we can head back to the lab
and see what we've got on the tape.
- So this is us, this is us
just turning on the camera.
'Cause this is the
perfect camera placement,
we can really get a
first-person perspective
of how it's viewing its whole world.
(calm music)
There's 101 ways we
can analyze these data.
There's information we can
get about the sea turtle,
its diving patterns, its feeding patterns,
how they socialize, what
are important habitats
for these animals, how much plastic
they're encountering in their realm,
and how much coral reef are they seeing.
And we can actually use the sea turtles
to survey these habitats.
- [Wes] It's almost hypnotic
watching the TurtleCam.
And it's clear how this
footage inspires people.
- When you hear about sea
turtles ingesting straws
and plastic bags, that could
be any of us that is at fault.
And getting people excited
about these animals
is often the impetus people need to live
a little bit more eco-friendly.
Then if the whole world is onboard
we're gonna be successful.
(chiming)
