Now, two-and-a-half months later, the hatchlings have emerged. All 15 of them! :D They were all perfectly formed, none of them has any deformities, and they were very active too.

Imagine my pleasant surprise when I discovered them this morning! We will be bringing these cute little hatchlings back to Setiu where we will weigh and measure them. This was our first attempt at incubating painted terrapin eggs and we are really pleased that a hatch rate of 100% was achieved.

Perhaps this is good omen that more good things will happen to the turtles?

The task appeared formidable at first, but once we got started, the interview-based surveys went off rather well. Pelf is commended for making the arrangements with the Village Headmen (names and contact numbers sourced from the respective District Officers).

The first interviews were conducted on 11 fishermen from the Setiu River. This was smooth as we know them rather well.  We were a little apprehensive about the survey of Sungai Keluang Besar in Kampong Pekan Sari Tembila as this was a new territory for us. But En. Marzuki, the village headman was very friendly and so were the six other fishermen who came to the Balai Raya (community hall) for the interviews. One of them has even invited us to go survey the river with him in his boat. We will do this at a later date if time allows.

The third village covered (Kampung Keluang) was on Sungai Keluang Kecil. Again, we were touched by the friendliness of the fishermen and their cooperation. Everyone involved was all smiles. We were indeed pleased to show our appreciation to all the interviewees by giving them each a TCC T-shirt and a copy of “Duta Kecil Penyu” (the malay version of “Little Turtle Messenger”).

The results of the interviews are being compiled. One positive outcome is that we enlisted the cooperation of the licensed egg collector in Keluang for painted terrapin eggs to initiate the incubation of the eggs.

The pictures below show some of the fishermen being interviewed and group pictures of most of the fishermen who were interviewed in the two villages we covered on the 30th of July 2010.

We would like to acknowledge our thanks to the US Fish and Wildlife Service for their support of this project, Low Si En for volunteering to help us conduct some of the interviews, En. Alias and En. Marzuki for arranging for the fishermen to come for the interviews and all the fishermen involved for their cooperation.

So the day came, I did the usual and thoroughly enjoyed myself sharing with them our humble efforts at TCC. I felt a lot of goodwill coming from the group members and we finished by exchanging gifts. A beautiful hand-made shawl from Pakistan and a WWF-Pakistan folder packed with project descriptions. Our gift to them was “Little Turtle Messenger.”

Later, a group of first year students from Universiti Malaysia Terengganu came to learn about terrapins and our projects at TCC.

The kids arrived shortly after I opened up our place. They were quite well-behaved when the guests were there, but soon after, it was the incessant “auntie, auntie, auntie…”

They took a break for the Friday prayers, but were back again. I have to admit that I do have a soft spot for them. They told me they had never ever touched, nor seen a real life marine turtle hatchling before. What else could I have done but contact Nurol from WWF to inquire if there were any hatchlings in their hatchery at Penarik Inn for release?

You should have seen the simultaneous jump for joy when the answer was “yes” … I could bring them to witness the release at 7.00 pm.

The day ended with me taking the solo drive back to KT. There were many attempts by the kids to persuade me to stay on. Alam and Aman offered to “teman” (keep me company) me and spend the night in TCC with me. So sweet of them, but unfortunately, I really had to leave.

Acknowledgements to River Foo and Nurol of WWF-Malaysia for making the day’s activities so meaningful and to our guests from Pakistan and UMT for taking the time off to visit us, and of course the kids for making it “never a dull moment” whenever I am back in TCC@Mangkok.