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Wednesday, April 28, 2004 Turtle nesting hatches lighting expertsBy VIRGINIA SMITH | News-Journal Staff Writer DAYTONA BEACH — Rick Parker won’t settle for being an ordinary turtle lighting expert. He wants to be a certified turtle lighting expert. Last month, the head of Sarasota-based Beeman Lights came here to take the state’s new turtle lighting course. State officials developed the course last fall and are bringing it to coastal counties during the 2004 nesting season, which begins Saturday. Parker came not just for the credentials, but to show off a few products, including the opportunistically named “Volusia Retro-Wall Pack,” a high-tech, color-changing lamp he hopes local hoteliers will snap up at $50 apiece. Then he got quizzed on matters of lighting wavelengths, light colors and sea turtle biology, with most of the questions derived from a 1996 state report. “I’d better have passed,” said Parker, whose turtle-friendly lamps were developed according to the same data he was tested on. “But they haven’t told me yet.” Come May 1, when sea turtle nesting season begins, beachfront residents and businesses will be tested, too. Lighting inspectors resume work Saturday, and will flunk anyone whose beachfront lights are wrongly positioned, improperly shielded or too bright. Volusia County prohibits any visible light sources on the beach from May 1 to Oct. 31. The lights can distract nesting females and disorient their hatchlings. At least two Volusia businesses have yet to pay their fines from last year, while new-season advisory letters went out weeks ago. Most fines issued are for less than $500; the county’s stated goal is compliance, not bankrupting people. But turtles continue to pay dearly. Volusia County lost about 2,000 hatchlings last year in 45 different lighting-related disorientations. And statewide, between 30,000 and 40,000 hatchlings are lost that way every year. So having turtle lighting certification – and a handful of firms like Parker’s breaking into the turtle lighting market – is something turtle advocates applaud. “It’s gonna become big business and it’s good, because people won’t have an excuse not to do the right thing,” said Beth Libert, president of the Volusia-Flagler Turtle Patrol. The idea for a turtle lighting course came about, said Dean Gallagher, an environmental specialist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, when officials saw people trying to comply with turtle lighting rules, but miscalculating – often at great expense to themselves. “One condo retrofitted the entire complex with blue lights,” he said, which can attract and disorient turtles (other colors – such as red and amber – help reduce disorientations). “It’s really hard to break it to people like that because they invested money and tried to do the right thing.” Volusia County officials had hoped more private citizens, not just lighting contractors, would show up at the April 13 workshop. But, they said, more people and businesses are keeping nesting-season lights all year, instead of switching to brighter ones when the season ends Oct. 31. Even if all of Volusia becomes compliant overnight, Gallagher said, the turtle-lighting firms still stand to make a buck here. “I see a market that’s wide open” as newer developments tend to be turtle-compliant and makeshift lamps would be better off replaced. On the net: HICI Special Report — Sea Turtles Need Help: Can you Dig it? |
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