nesting populations. Moreover, extrapolation of these figures to 

 total population sizes is impossible due to lack of knowledge 

 about natural sex ratios and age structures of populations. 



The hawksbill is listed as an endangered species in the lUCN 

 Red Data Book (Groombridge 1982) , and is included on Appendix 1 

 of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of 

 Wild Fauna and Flora, or CITES. CITES prohibits international 

 trade among member parties, which number 95 countries. With only 

 a few concentrated nesting sites known worldwide, few protected 

 habitats, and centuries of heavy exploitation for tortoiseshell, 

 the hawksbill is considered to be highly endangered throughout 

 its range. It is thought by many to be only second to Kemp's 

 ridley in terms of degree of endangerment. 



The status of the hawksbill in the Caribbean as reviewed at 

 WATS I in 1983 (Meylan 1984b) , mirrored that of the rest of the 

 world; that is, no large nesting aggregations could be identified 

 and heavy exploitation was reported to be occurring throughout 

 the region. Table 1, reproduced from Table 6 of the WATS I 

 proceedings (Bacon et al. 1984), shows the estimated number of 

 nesting female hawksbills by country for the period 1977 to 1982. 

 Many countries filed no estimate, in some cases because no 

 nesting hawksbills had been recorded, in others because 

 quantitative information on the species was insufficient. Many 

 countries not reporting population estimates did, however, come 

 prepared with good qualitative information, and knowledge of the 

 status of the species as of 1983 is better than the table 

 implies. One correction that should be noted is the number given 

 for Belize, 31, which represents average yearly nests, rather 

 than average number of nesting females . The numbers in this 

 table in some cases represent census data recorded in the field, 

 whereas others are yearly estimates based on census data. Still 

 others are estimates that were based solely on other kinds of 

 data, such as interviews or questionnaires completed by 

 fishermen. Some of the higher figures, including 300 females for 

 Jamaica and 500 for Grenada, fall into this last category. As 

 the national representatives of those countries pointed out at 

 WATS I, these estimates need to be corroborated by actual field 

 investigations. Data gathered for WATS II will probably provide 

 more of this necessary corroboration. 



A more recent attempt to evaluate the status of populations 

 of the hawksbill turtle was made by Groombridge and Luxmoore 

 (1987) , of the Conservation Monitoring Center in Cambridge, 

 England. Their draft document was circulated in the summer of 

 1987. These authors made an extensive review of the literature 

 on both hawksbills and green turtles on a worldwide basis, 

 relying heavily on WATS I data for Caribbean countries. They 

 devised a numerical ranking system in which they placed hawksbill 

 nesting populations of each geopolitical unit. They acknowledged 

 in their report the difficulties inherent in censusing 



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