Trinidad supports nesting by one of the largest colonies of leatherback sea turtles globally. A preliminary analysis of leatherback population size and status for Trinidad concluded that the island’s nesting population increased throughout the 1990’s at an estimated 5% per year. That upward trend reversed in 2006, however, and thereafter indicated “a rapid and continuous decline” (Eckert 2013). The impetus behind the decline is unknown, but given that professionally trained community-based conservation groups have been successfully safe-guarding gravid females since the 1990’s,

Published 2018 by Scott A. Eckert, WIDECAST and Kyle Mitchell, Nature Seekers

Prepared by the Northwest Atlantic Leatherback Working Group

Bryan Wallace and Karen Eckert, Compilers and Editors. Conservation Science Partners and the Wider Caribbean Sea Turtle Conservation Network (WIDECAST). WIDECAST Technical Report No. 16. Godfrey, Illinois. 36 pp. ISSN: 1930-3025

Published 2018

A combination of sonar data collection and dive surveys were employed to describe the closest Caribbean Coral habitats to South America

Published 2018 by Evana Douglas, Deanesh Ramsewak, Kelly Kingon, and Dawn A T Phillip

A perspective on the reconstruction of long-term food chains in the Caribbean using information gathered from reefs. A chapter from the book “Marine Conservation Paleobiology”.

Published 2018 by Peter D. Roopnarine and Ashley A. Dineen

One of the world’s largest subpopulations of the leatherback sea turtle breed on the north and east coasts of Trinidad. Between 4,500 and 11,000 of these oceanic turtles nest at Matura/Fishing Pond and Grande Riviere beaches. However, leatherbacks residing in Trinidad’s water between January and September each year are subject to very high mortality in coastal gillnet fisheries. It has been calculated that 3,000 leatherbacks become entangled in gillnets each year off the Trinidad coast, with a mortality rate of 30% .

Published Nov 2013 by Scott A. Eckert

Initial assessment determining that Trinidad’s east coast nesting population of leatherbacks continued to grow through the 1990s until 2006, and has been in a rapid and continuous decline since that time

 Published Oct 2013 by Scott A. Eckert, WIDECAST

A look at the basic composition of current reefs on Trinidad’s north coast, and what makes them different from reefs elsewhere.

Published 2012 By Stanton G. Belford, and Dawn A.T. Phillip

The movements and behavior of nine female leatherback sea turtles, Dermochelys coriacea (L.) were monitored for up to 370 days from their nesting beaches on the Caribbean island of Trinidad between 1995 and 2004 using satellite-linked time and depth recorders.

Published March 2006 by Scott A. Eckert

A report on the first deployments of satellite tags on male leatherbacks

Marine Biology (2005) 147: 845–853 DOI 10.1007/s00227-005-1581-1

Published 16 June 2005

by Michael C. James, Scott A. Eckert and Ransom A. Myers

Four post-nesting hawksbill turtles in Barbados were fitted with satellite transmitters during the 1998 nesting season as part of a Caribbean-wide hawksbill research satellite tracking project. The four study animals left Barbados waters immediately following their final nesting activity for the season and travelled for periods of between 7 and 18 days to reach foraging grounds in Dominica, Grenada, Trinidad, and Venezuela, respectively. Straight-line travel distances ranged from 200 to 435 km. All turtles settled at locations where sea conditions made them relatively inaccessible to fishermen, and this may be a key to their survival in countries where turtle fishing is permitted.

Published 2001

Che!onian Conservation and Biologv, 2001, 4( I): 107-114

By Julia A. Horrocks, Lotus A. Vermeer, Barry Krueger, Michael Coyne,

Barbara A. Schroeder, and George H. Balazs