Under the theme ‘Nurturing Community Research to Protect our Environment’, the premiere turtle festival held in Yupukari, Rupununi, saw the release of 57 turtles to their native habitat after a year of “headstarting”- a kind of re-introduction program.
At the festival, there were eight educational booths on turtles set up around the village market and in the Rupununi Learners’ Caiman House compound. Wildlife members, adults and other children took turns through the morning to each booth for educational activities, games or craft.
In the ‘Crochet Turtles’ booth, participants, using yarn and knitting needles, knitted turtle crafts to take home. The children in the ‘Pin the Tail on the Turtle’ booth enjoyed being blindfolded and tasked with pinning a ‘tail’ to a drawing of a turtle pasted on a wall. The ‘Water Balloon toss’ was a cooperative game in which students tossed balloons filled with water to their teammates, to transport the balloons across a field. The team that was able to pass the most balloons without bursting them, won.
Participants also completed a short survey about local use and harvesting of turtles. This data is used by the Yupukari River Turtle Conservation Team and Yupukari Village Council to create appropriate resource management guidelines for river turtle harvest.
The ‘Microscope booth’ instructed participants how to use compound microscopes to explore the microbial organisms living in the turtle pond. Using identification keys, participants identified and kept records of the different organisms inhabiting the turtle pond.
There was also the ‘Turtle shell archery’ contest, where participants were taught about turtle shell anatomy and the turtle monitoring marking scheme for a long term turtle mark/recapture study. They aimed at a target that had a drawing of a river turtle shell and, using the turtle marking scheme, points were awarded based on which part of the shell they hit on the target.
Later in the afternoon of the event, 57 head-started turtles were released into a pond adjacent to Yupukari. Each participant had a turtle which was released in the pond. At this booth, participants picked out which turtle they wanted to release, and then weighed and measured it. They recorded the data, which will be used to compare to wild growth rates when the turtles are recaptured. Participants also photographed their turtle and made a turtle data sheet that contains the weight and size of the turtle, plus the photograph.
The festival, which provided the staging for the second annual mini wildlife festival, also gave the Yupukari Wildlife clubs an opportunity to showcase their talents and promote their clubs. One of the fun events for the clubs was marching around the village, displaying banners and costumes.
The wildlife clubs competed in different age groups in various athletic competitions such as Shebai eating competition, lime and spoon race, walk race, 100-meter race, 3-legged race, sack race, cassava grating competition, and needle and thread race.
The ‘Wildlife Club Culture Show and Performance Competition’ encouraged each wildlife club to perform skits, songs, and dramatic poetry as well as the performance of cultural items. Village elders were called on to share traditional Macushi stories about turtles and other local wildlife.
Additionally, those in attendance enjoyed watching and reading “Yertle the Turtle”, a Dr Seuss, book and movie. They also gathered in the primary school to watch a projected presentation about the history of the Yupukari turtle project. The project’s team presented their findings and talked about their accomplishments. They welcomed input from others for the future of the project. Following that, 2 short films were shown about Podocnemis expansa, the amazing Giant South American turtle; monitoring and head-starting in Brazil and Bolivia.
