From J.E. Davies
Your record of a French environment official saying that the Cayman Island Turtle Farm is “a similar ranch operation” to that on the island of Réunion (This Week, 14 January) is far wide of the mark. This gentleman should visit Cayman before making such inaccurate statements.
The Cayman farm has not taken turtles or turtle eggs from the wild since 1978. It is totally self-supporting with eggs now being produced from turtles which were themselves born at the farm. It produces about 1800 turtles per year for local consumption but also releases large numbers of hatchlings and yearlings into the wild every year (26 995 between 1980 and 1991) and is very concerned with turtle conservation.
