Big Smile, No Teeth: Trotting out some good news on turtles

The Star

27-04-2025

Here's something different for a change: some good news!
Endangered sea turtle populations are showing signs of growing a little. That's right. The animal that launched an assault on plastic straws – when video of a turtle getting a plastic straw removed from its nose went viral – is seeing a rebound in its numbers.
Did the banning of plastic straws in a lot of places help? I mean, it couldn't have hurt, but straws aren't what's endangering turtles to begin with.
A quick recap: Turtles were facing extinction – and still remain threatened – for a variety of reasons. One of the big ones is hunting. Which is no surprise, humans' approach to wildlife for centuries has been exactly like that Arnold Schwarzenegger quote from Predator , 'If it bleeds, we can kill it'. Yes, humans, you certainly can. And we kill turtles for food, medicine, and of course luxury items. Nothing says you're rich like using a tortoise shell comb on your salon-quality hair.
But human hunting isn't the only issue. Other human actions also play a big part. Habitat loss, for example, is a big problem with any endangered species. And turtles are losing their habitat to tourism because humans love hanging out at a fun beach, and beaches are where turtles nest. When it comes to nesting turtles or us chilling in the sun drinking a RM20 drink, guess who wins? We do. Usually.
And fishing is also a problem: Even if we don't actively hunt the shell-backed creatures, they get caught up and injured accidentally and die in fishing nets; they also get stuck and die in abandoned nets left to drift in our seas – they're called, appropriately, 'ghost nets'.
But some of this is turning around.
Do people still want to eat turtles and use their shells for medicine? Probably, but international trade bans like the Cites (Convention on Inter-national Trade in Endangered Species) listings have made it illegal to export or import turtle products in most countries. Laws have been implemented to protect turtles and their eggs, with heavy fines for poaching.
Also, attitudes towards turtles are changing. Traditional Chinese medicine once used turtle shells to help with organ health but, thanks in part to awareness campaigns, more and more practitioners are now questioning animal-based remedies, especially those linked to endangered species.
And in places where turtles are considered a delicacy, a shift is happening as younger generations look at turtles as animals to protect, not to eat, and have even stopped buying turtle eggs following bans on their sale.
As for nesting beaches, many are now protected. In fact, many beach resorts exist close to turtle nesting beaches, proof that you can enjoy your expensive beach drinks and not drive a species to extinction. Win, win.
To address fishing and catching turtles accidentally in nets, turtle excluder devices (TEDs) are now mandatory in many countries. These help turtles escape the nets.
Raising awareness and implementing smart laws are turning the tide in favour of the turtles. But it is a slow process. It has taken decades but some turtle populations are on the rise again. Green sea turtles were less than 300 in 1989 in Florida but now number 61,000 on monitored beaches, according to the Florida Fish And Wildlife Conservation Commission in the United States.
Kemps's ridley turtles were nearly extinct in the 1980s but have been slowly increasing in numbers thanks to international conservation efforts. Florida, for one, proudly announced that nesting sites on its coast increased from 10 in 2023 to 24 in 2024.
But it's not all great news. Leatherback turtles are still critically endangered. It seems this is because leatherbacks are picky where they nest and a lot of their nesting sites have been taken over by humans or eroded. They're not as easy to lure to new sites as other species have been.
The other issue is leatherbacks migrate across entire oceans, so they are vulnerable to fishing that doesn't employ TEDs. And one of the more tragic factors is leatherbacks are hit harder by plastic pollution than other turtles.
Why?
Leatherbacks eat jellyfish. What looks like a jellyfish in water? Plastic bags.
Poor leatherbacks are thinking they're eating dinner and instead are chowing down on a plastic bag that can block their digestive system, lead to malnutrition, or just kill them outright. Postmortems of many leatherbacks have revealed their stomachs are full of trash.
Sorry, this has sort of descended into bad news when I promised nothing but good news at the start of this column. I suppose the good news here is given time, nature can and will heal itself. We humans just need to figure out how to get out of the way. Big Smile, No Teeth columnist Jason Godfrey – a model who once was told to give the camera a 'big smile, no teeth' – has worked internationally for two decades in fashion and continues to work in dramas, documentaries, and lifestyle programming. Write to him at [e-mail] and follow him on Instagram @bigsmilenoteeth and facebook.com/bigsmilenoteeth. The views expressed here are entirely the writer's own.