Passage I

A Saturday with the Sea Turtles

Hawaii's green sea turtle, has been classified as an endangered species for over 25 years. Signs around the Mauna Lani lagoon warn tourists to keep their distance from the humped creatures that look like gray-green boulders along the shoreline. My friends and me, however, ignore the signs, wade into the water, and struggling to flip a 150-pound turtle onto its back in the center of an oversized inner tube. We aren't being intentionally cruel. Nor are we breaking the law. We are spending another sunny Hawaiian Saturday volunteering for a government-sponsored sea turtle research project.

We float our latest turtle ashore. Flippers flapping and beak snapping, the turtle resists as we hoist it onto the examination table that we've set up beneath an awning on the beach. It's my turn to enact the exam. As I weigh the turtle and measure its carapace (shell), another volunteer, Kiko, watches as I record the data. Tourists always seem delighted by the opportunity to closely observe a turtle.

Kiko tells the tourists that this turtle has likely made a remarkable migration from breeding grounds in shoals located over 400 miles away.(8) I open the turtle's mouth so I can document what it has been eating, and I wonder if the turtle is hungry. Kiko laughs and says that one of the first lessons a volunteer learns is that green sea turtles have terrible breath! A supervising marine biologist helps me insert a small microchip—a tag—beneath the skin of one flipper. Tagging helps with monitoring the turtle population and gathering information to help the turtles recover from their endangered status.

After we pull the heavy turtle back to the water. I don fins, a mask, and a snorkel watching the turtle after it's released. Though shy and quiet on land, these animals are graceful swimmers. Kicking my fins, I follow the turtle as it beats its flippers like wings and soars through the canyon reefs toward the deep water beyond.