Environment

As turtle nesting season gets underway for 2020, experts at Hol Chan Marine Reserve as the public to be cautious and careful with the nesting grounds.

With the recent heavy downpours over most of the country, the many fires that were creating unbearably smokey conditions in the western and central municipalities of the country are now extinguished. This brings to an end the weeks of firefighting effort by the Forest Department, the Fire Department, the Town and City Councils, and many other partner organizations. The Ministry of Fisheries, Forestry, the Environment and Sustainable Development, through valuable financial support from the Protected Areas Conservation Trust (PACT), the Belize Electricity Company Limited (BECOL), and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), was able to invest significantly in the use of aerial firefighting to help to control the unprecedented wildfires that raged through the Cayo District.

While the world battles a pandemic, Belize also faces the threat of another wave of Sargassum headed its way via the Atlantic. Island authorities say they are monitoring the mats of seaweed edging their way to our shores.

It is believed that the marker buoy had drifted a little bit too much to the right of the Tuffy channel, sitting on top of the reef, causing the Mexican boat that used that buoy as a marker point to run aground the reef itself.

Though not to the extent of the mainland bushfire crisis causing large economic losses, San Pedro's Fire Department dealt with a challenging blaze in northern Ambergris Caye on Tuesday, April 28th.

The Forest Department, the Department of the Environment and other agencies including the Fire Department, the Belmopan City Council, and the business community continue to join forces to fight fires around Belmopan and out west in the Vaca Forest Reserve. Major successes were recorded Sunday April 26th, around Belmopan and in the Vaca Forest Reserve.

Fishers Edwin Flores, Andy Cob, Cesar Lima, and Elvis Hercules were detained in separate incidents on Saturday, April 25th, in a joint operation conducted by the Hol Chan Marine Reserve (HCMR) and the San Pedro Police Formation.

The public was advised on April 2, 2020, of the closure of all protected areas to visitors and the public for the duration of the state of emergency. There remained, however, the duty of safeguarding all assets and resources from potential illegal activities and vandalism/theft of physical and natural assets on the sites.As a result of enforcement activities, on April 24, 2020, Jose Angel Maravilla, Juaquin Ico, Florencio Choc, Elsueio Cho and Alfus Edwards, all of San Roman Village in the Stann Creek District were charged for the offenses of: 1) Illegal Entry into a Wildlife Sanctuary 2) Illegal Hunting within a Wildlife Sanctuary and 3) Illegal Fishing within a Wildlife Sanctuary.