Some friends I have been visiting for years.

[pilau]

This is at Punalu'u Beach Park. They come up on the sand daily. On this day there were 8 of them. I have been going here for about 15 years to see them. They are hawksbill turtles. They are endangered and you are not supposed to touch them. When I was younger I would go to the small tide pools and they would come in and I would hold on to their shells and they take you for a ride. They love doing that too. they keep coming back. Once they started enforcing the laws of not touching them I stopped due to some people ended up in jail over it. Well enjoy!

Here is a view of the area they live in.

While I was out there I made a rare spotting of the Hawaii state bird. The Nene

Them with their baby.

The cool thing is I only ive about 20 or 30 minutes from these guys.

Thanks for looking.

 

[kyleking007]

Awesome! thanks for sharing wish i could see it in real life. you are lucky.

 

[pilau]

Awesome! thanks for sharing wish i could see it in real life. you are lucky.

It is pretty awesome to be able to see this when ever I want. Hard to replace. Thanks for the comment!

 

[davo]

Wow that must be cool being able to see them like that. The turtles are awesome. How big are they? Lucky indeed...

Nene's are awesome. I live about 15 mins away from the WWT in slimbridge... they are my favourite birds there, very personable. They've become tame and interactive at the reserve. Love 'em.

Heres a bit from wikipedia

This is the world's rarest goose. Once common, hunting and introduced predators such as mongooses, pigs, and cats reduced the population to 30 birds by 1952. However, this species breeds well in captivity, and has been successfully re-introduced so in 2004 it was estimated that there were 500 birds in the wild (and good numbers in wildfowl collections). However, there is some concern of inbreeding due to the small population of birds. The nature reserve WWT Slimbridge in England was instrumental in the successful breeding of Nēnē geese in captivity, under the direction of the leading conservationist Sir Peter Scott, during the 1950s, for later re-introduction into the wild in Hawaii. There are still Nene geese at Slimbridge today.

 

[duke33]

Nice pics. Thanks for sharing them with us. Beautiful place.

 

[Death Pony]

Those groups shots of the hawksbills are awesome!!!!!! Nice Nene pics too!

 

[pilau]

Wow that must be cool being able to see them like that. The turtles are awesome. How big are they? Lucky indeed...

Nene's are awesome. I live about 15 mins away from the WWT in slimbridge... they are my favourite birds there, very personable. They've become tame and interactive at the reserve. Love 'em.

Heres a bit from wikipedia

That is really cool! I didn't know they were being bred there. I know they are constantly working on that here. I guess it is working with that baby.

The turtles are about 3 1/2 to 4 feet long.

Thanks everyone for the comments and info!

 

[davo]

yeah, noticed the little one in the pic. They are such cool geese, it's their necks I think.

Do the hawksbill breed on those beaches?

 

[ghostknifefish0909]

whao! thats sweet i wish my surrondings look that good.

-GKF

 

[Modest_Man]

Those are green sea turtles. Not hawksbill.

Hawksbill will be smaller (125lbs at maturity) have a flatter shell, have overlapping scutes, a more colorfull shell, and the charasteristic beak.

I lived in Manoa for a few years and dealt a bit with doing FPV counts with greens.

Great photos. Almost makes me miss Oahu.