Illegal cockfighting threatens endangered sea turtles across Central America

Cockfighting has been illegal in Costa Rica for more than a century, but this violent tradition persists underground across the country. To make the birds deadlier, their owners often tie razor-sharp blades to their legs, known as gaffs or cockspurs. Aside from the roosters, which get seriously injured or killed during fights, another species has become an unlikely victim of the cockspur trade: the hawksbill sea turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata), a critically endangered species whose shell is often used to make these deadly implements.

Hawksbills have long been targeted for their black-and-brown mottled shells, used in jewelry, combs and other decorations going back to ancient Rome. The species was also historically hunted for its meat as far back as the fifth century B.C.E. in China.

Maike Heidemeyer, a Costa Rica-based marine biologist and head of biodiversity and community for the nonprofit conservation group Natural Capital Reserve, first noticed tortoiseshell spurs at holiday markets about two decades ago after moving to the country from Germany. The spurs were openly displayed, mixed in with other hawksbill-shell products like bracelets and trinkets. Though she says these types of bold exhibitions of hawksbill products have tapered off in recent years, demand remains, despite the nationwide ban on cockfighting.

“There are associations, groups that openly defend their right to fight cocks, even in Costa Rica,” says Heidemeyer, who has been long involved in sea turtle research and founded Equipo Tora Carey, an organization devoted to coastal marine conservation. “Of course it’s illegal, but then they do it hidden.”

The hawksbill’s beak-like mouth is also sold along the Costa Rican-Panamanian border for cockfights, according to Spanish publication El País, which says owners put them on top of their birds’ beaks.

Fighting back against the trade

Most of Costa Rica’s hawksbill spurs come into the country overland from Nicaragua to the north and Panama to the south, Heidemeyer tells Mongabay.

In an effort to crack down on cockfighting, Costa Rican authorities have seized hundreds of these spurs in recent years. In May 2024, a bust near the Nicaraguan border seized 29 hawksbill spurs, while a 2019 operation in Guanacaste province in northwestern Costa Rica confiscated 98 smuggled spikes.

However, this probably barely scratches the surface of the trade, Heidemeyer says. And though the government is cracking down on spurs and other cockfighting paraphernalia, “nobody’s really asking about the material of the spike that they’re seeing,” she says, noting that hawksbill shell is easily mistaken for plastic. An easy way to differentiate shell-derived products from plastic is to burn them: when lit, turtle shell smells like human hair burning, as it’s made up of the same protein, keratin.

Didiher Chacón, founder and director of the Latin American Sea Turtles Association (LAST), says his organization trains Costa Rican officers to help them identify hawksbill products. He and his team also work undercover, buying spurs and other products from sellers in order to build criminal cases they can present to authorities. They also monitor online social networks for posts selling hawksbill spurs and report them to get them removed.

Still, conservationists face huge hurdles. For instance, frequent officer turnover makes it difficult to ensure staff are adequately trained to identify hawksbill shells when they encounter them, Heidemeyer tells Mongabay.

“Our system in customs is just looking for guns and drugs, not these product,” Chacón says. “I think we need to work harder to try to train the mail officers and the customs police to stop these things.”

An international problem

Experts warn that these occasional confiscations don’t address the root of the issue: the illegal harvest of hawksbills for their shells. Although the species is protected under CITES, the convention that regulates the international wildlife trade, that hasn’t stopped poachers.

According to Chacón, who has worked in sea turtle conservation for more than three decades, neighboring Nicaragua is a hotspot for trading hawksbill products.

“They are not in the most important international agreements like the Inter-American Convention [for the Protection and Conservation of Sea Turtles],” he says.

And while the situation has improved in countries like Colombia and the Dominican Republic, there’s still room for improvement, Chacón adds.

To help stop the trade, Chacón’s group trains people in countries like Guatemala, Honduras and Panama to better recognize hawksbill products.

Panama has shown some success in fighting back against the trade in recent years. In 2022, for instance, raids at two businesses in the province of Chiriquí resulted in the seizure of 199 hawksbill spurs. Local law enforcement also recently enlisted the help of Jeffrey Seminoff, head of the marine turtle program at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center, to help them identify the origin of a confiscated batch of 77 cockfighting spurs made from hawksbill shells.

Since turtles’ bodies take on the unique isotopic signature of their habitat, Seminoff and his research partner, Joel Schumacher, analyzed levels of stabilized nitrogen and carbon in the spurs, comparing them to baseline levels found in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean.

They found that 69 of the spurs originated in the Atlantic-Caribbean region. While this wasn’t too surprising, as most of Latin America’s hawksbills reside in Atlantic waters, “there are eight of those samples that came from the Pacific,” Seminoff says. “And so it indicated to us — it’s like irrefutable evidence — that the hawksbill supply chain in Panama is getting animals sourced from both their Atlantic coast and their Pacific coast.”

Seminoff says this kind of information could help conservationists focus their efforts on the areas with the highest poaching rates — in this case, Panama’s Caribbean region. Though no other countries have requested similar analyses, “I felt like this was a really valuable project and something that I’d like to do again if the offer presents itself,” Seminoff tells Mongabay.

Changing mindsets and behaviors

In Costa Rica, LAST runs educational programs in primary and secondary schools located near beaches where people hunt hawksbills, as well as in bigger cities along the coast, aiming to engage children in sea turtle conservation from an early age.

Chacón says consumer actions are critically important when it comes to protecting turtles. When poachers harvest hawksbills, they’re not targeting them specifically for spurs but also for other products, which often find their way into tourist shops and online markets worldwide.

“The behavior code of tourists [is very important], especially when it comes to tropical areas — how they can create a footprint buying these things,” he says. “The thing is to educate the tourists to not buy turtle products. Do not try to buy or to eat turtle eggs or turtle meat or any aphrodisiac drink like the mamajuana in Dominican Republic or Cuba that has some body parts of the turtle.”

However, communities also must shift their mindset about cockfighting in order to make a difference for turtles and roosters, Heidemeyer says. Though Costa Rica’s cockfighting ban was recently upheld by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights after being challenged by the country’s National Association of Cockfighting Breeders in 2017 — a victory celebrated by animal welfare groups — both she and Chacón are uncertain about any impact this will have on cockfighting or turtle harvests. Cockfighting also remains legal in many other countries, like Colombia and Panama.

“I’m not sure if this is ever going to be eradicated until the people change their mind, their attitude towards animal welfare,” Heidemeyer says.

This article by Tina Deines was first published by Mongabay.com on 13 December 2024. Lead Image: The hawksbill sea turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata), a critically endangered species, is often used to make spurs for cockfighting. Image by Leonardo Lamas via Unsplash.

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