Oscar Aranda
Elsewhere on this site we would normally feature individuals who have become world renowned for their selfless deeds. Figures such as Ghandi, Mother Teresa and more contemporary people such as the Burmese political activist Aung San Suu Kyi are globally renowned. However there are others who perform selfless, vital work in their local environments who do not look for recognition and quite often receive none.
Oscar Aranda
Oscar Aranda is an impressive individual; a resident of Puerto Vallarta in Mexico and someone who has made an enormous difference to the local environment. Many such people experience one moment which acts as a turning point in their lives and Aranda is no different. Always interested in wildlife, he had studied biology in college and gained an interest in sea creatures.
Turtle Eggs
The moment which launched him on his career however did not happen until some years later when he was called by the police to the beachfront where they had come across a turtle in a bucket, chopped to pieces and, as Aranda explained, with “his heart still pounding.” The police had no idea what to do with the scene in front of them and of course there was nothing Aranda could do to save the turtle but it did prompt him to begin a campaign to protect the turtles in that area.
Turtle poaching is a serious problem in Mexico but the authorities believe there is no real profit motive in stealing turtle eggs. One egg sells for about 50 cents so nobody gets rich by stealing turtle eggs. It appears to be the lure of eating a forbidden thing, or perhaps the myth that the egg is an aphrodisiac which makes the continued egg poaching such a problem. The Mexican government has responded to the problem by increasing financial penalties for those caught killing, poaching or trafficking turtles but the problem still remains.
Vallarta Rescue
Oscar Aranda first saw that dead turtle more than ten years ago and since then he has patrolled the turtle nesting areas along Mexico’s north west Pacific beaches, protecting them from the poaching which still continues. The nesting season runs from June to December. Aranda is an unpaid activist but he is not the only one; in 2004 he started Vallarta Rescue, an organisation dedicated to protecting the turtles in this area. He now oversees a number of volunteers who give up their nights to protect the eggs.
Protecting the turtles is an interactive process; the watcher will clear a path for the pregnant turtle to come out of the water in the dark and lay her eggs. When the turtle has buried her newly laid eggs and returned to the sea the Vallarta Rescue operators will dig up the eggs and take them to a special hatchery located at nearby Marriott Hotel.
This arrangement works well for both parties – the eggs are cared for in a protected space and in return Vallarta Rescue offers turtle conservation talks and opportunities to see the eggs hatching to the hotel’s guests. At certain times guests are even able to take part in the release of a baby turtle which is something, says Aranda, “that they will never forget.”