Extinction implies the disappearance of an entire species, and in 

 that regard no argument about the status of the Kemp's ridley is 

 raised. But population extinction is also a serious matter. In 

 the USA, not so many years ago, a hydro-electric power project 

 was stalled because the population of some "insignificant" little 

 fish called the snaildarter would be wiped out. There are 

 several other populations of this fish, and the species is not 

 about to go extinct. What makes the demise of the western 

 Atlantic olive ridley so different and unimportant? Obviously 

 the reason is that it has no champion coming to the rescue, and 

 that it is apparently far from the sphere of interested persons 

 and pressure from conservationists. 



Undoubtedly the shrimp fleets operating on the foraging 

 grounds and off the nesting beaches of the olive ridleys are the 

 primary cause of mortality. Not until pressure is exerted on the 

 owners of the boats to modify their fishing gear will any relief 

 from this mortality factor occur. The situation is critical, and 

 action will have to be taken soon. Otherwise, the presence of 

 olive ridleys in the western Atlantic region will have been a 

 historical event. 



I hope that the information given here, and in the olive 

 ridley species synopsis presented at this meeting, will create a 

 change of attitude about the plight of the olive ridley. 



Acknowledcments 



I would like to acknowledge the contribution to sea turtle 

 conservation, which has been, and still is being made by the 

 fieldworkers in our region. 



I cannot, of course, speak for all of my colleagues, but I 

 know that many of us are indebted to those anonymous people in 

 the field, who supply us with day-to-day records that they, on 

 our behalf, collect on the beaches. In addition, those field 

 workers often possess practical, and sometimes quite useful, 

 knowledge about sea turtles, which cannot be found in textbooks. 

 Many researchers have undoubtedly benefited from associations 

 with field personnel. I, for one, have increased my knowledge 

 about sea turtles considerably in this manner. 



I would, therefore, like to express my appreciation for the 

 contribution that the fieldworkers have made, and continue to 

 make, to sea turtle conservation, in general. But most of all I 

 want to thank the beach personnel of the Surinam Forest Service, 

 and the fieldworkers of the Foundation for Nature Preservation in 

 Surinam (STINASU) . I have walked many miles along the beaches of 

 Surinam myself, but they pale into insignificance when compared 

 to the hundreds of miles of beach each one of the workers walks 



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