I love wildlife but there is one thing that has always gotten me about the tree-hugger zealot types. Saving all 9 thousand chicks would be impossible but if they had saved a dozen chicks that would be six times as many as did survive.
I’ve always thought that about the sea turtles. They have all these regulations to protect sea turtle hatchlings from human activity. But then they just stand back and “let nature take its course” while Frigate birds grab nine out of ten of them before they get to the water. Then only a small percentage of the ones that get to the water survive to adulthood.
Get the volunteers out on the beaches and screw the Frigate birds out of dinner. Make sure that 8 out of ten turtle hatchlings get to the water just once or twice a decade and the total population should increase dramatically.
In that case, intervention would not create dependency. I agree with your take on it. That is a very reasoned option.
You could dramatically improve the numbers of the species in a few years.