'Crazy Turtle Woman' transforms graveyard into maternity ward

[IDemo]

MATURA, Trinidad (CNN) -- With its white sand and clear, blue water, Trinidad's Matura Beach looks like a postcard. It's a far cry from its recent past, when leatherback sea turtle carcasses littered the ground and kept tourists away.

"Twenty years ago, this was a graveyard," Suzan Lakhan Baptiste said of the six-mile stretch of beach near her home.

"The stench was horrendous. You could smell it for miles," she said.

Saddened and frustrated, Baptiste launched a crusade to help end the slaughter of the gentle giants. Today, she and her group are succeeding: What was once a turtle graveyard is now a maternity ward -- one of the largest leatherback nesting colonies in the world.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/05/28/cnnheroes.suzan.lakhan.baptiste/index.htmlhttp://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/05/28/cnnheroes.suzan.lakhan.baptiste/index.html

[xchrom]

1. recommend

[stuntcat]

2. R!

Sally_Mander showed me this yesterday!

This woman is totally responsible for the whole group surviving.

[Omaha Steve]

3. A couple years ago for Mothers Day Marta got a certificate of sea turtle adoption

Suzan Lakhan Baptiste's efforts have turned a beach from a leatherback turtle graveyard to a nesting colony.


She had adopted a clutch of sea turtle eggs on the Texas coast. We both are pro animal rights etc.

K&R!

[eppur_se_muova]

4. Big kudos to this woman!

Leatherbacks are some of the coolest creatures on the planet -- more like 'reptilian whales' than turtles (they have no actual shell, hence the name). It's a crying shame that any creature so harmless should be endangered due to man's activities.

[pleah]

5. K&R

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/05/28/cnnheroes.suzan.lakhan.baptiste/index.html

[bananas]

6. k&r for the correct link. nt