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Local Girl Scout helps save sea turtles

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Growing up in San Diego has given Victoria Slocum a special affinity for the ocean, and this summer she put that passion into action thousands of miles from home.

Slocum, 15, and a sophomore at Helix Charter High School, worked on conservation of endangered leatherback sea turtles in Panama during a two-week trip offered by Girl Scouts of America through Outward Bound.

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“I’ve always wanted to go to a Latin American country, because I just love the Spanish culture,” the La Mesa teen said. “And also sea turtles and marine life was an important conservation project for me. So this was an amazing opportunity that encompassed my dreams.”

Leatherbacks are endangered throughout their range in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, and populations off the coast of Mexico and Costa Rica have crashed in recent years. The marine reptiles are hunted for eggs and meat, and die from boat strikes, pollution and entanglement in commercial fishing gear. Beachfront lighting also disorients hatchlings, and predators devour the eggs.

“They’re such majestic creatures, and in such danger of becoming extinct,” Slocum said. “We learned that only one in a thousand sea turtles survive into the wild.”

On the two-week journey that started June 18, Slocum joined a group of nine girls ages 13 to 18 on a flight to Costa Rica, followed by a drive to the Panamanian conservation area San San Pond Sak. The nearly 40,000-acre preserve is a wetland of international importance, and home to sea turtles, manatees, monkeys, sloths, iguanas and birds.

There Slocum and her travel companions took turns patrolling the beaches at night for the arrival of nesting leatherbacks, or their newly hatched baby turtles.

Using a wheelbarrow, they transported the hatchlings to the sea, in order to ensure their safe passage. Over the course of several nights they ushered 60 to 70 of the hatchings to the surf, she said.

Adult leatherbacks have black shells with long ridges, and can grow from four to eight feet long and weigh 500 to 2,000 pounds, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Slocum said the ones she sent to sea were miniature versions of those.

“They were about as big as the palm of your hand,” she said. “They were little and really cute.”

Later in the trip, Slocum and her fellow travelers earned their scuba certifications and learned about marine ecology in a different part of Panama.

Slocum said her fascination with the ocean began early, and is part of the flow of her family life. Both her parents work as marine engineers, and Slocum hopes to become a biotech engineer after high school.

Her mother, Anne-Lise Slocum, said she felt confident her daughter was prepared for the international trip and outdoor work.

Solstice, an endangered Olive Ridley sea turtle, was stranded in Washington state. She was brought to San Diego by the Coast Guard to recuperate at Sea World.

“I thought it was a great experience for a teenager to gain that self-confidence of being an independent young woman in today’s world,” she said.

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