Save Our Sea TurtlesThe Laurel Springs Environmental Club Effort

to Help Sea Turtles Around the World.By Michelle, Brittany, and Maddie

What is a Sea Turtle?Sea turtles live in warm, temperate seas all around the

globe. They usually live in coastal areas, sometimes venturing out to open seas.

There are 8 species of sea turtles and five of them spend some or all of their lives in the Gulf of Mexico. They are the Green, Loggerhead, Kemp’s ridley, Hawksbill, and Leatherback turtles.

The Green and Kemp’s ridley turtles are both endangered, while the other three species are threatened.

The Kemp’s ridley is the only turtle to spend its entire life in the Gulf of Mexico.

Hawksbill Kemp’s Ridley

Sea turtles are not very social animals, but groups of turtles will form when migrating or when feeding. Groups of females are sometimes seen during egg laying season.

Turtles eat a wide variety of seafood, including seaweed, jellyfish, sea squirts, sponges, and crabs. However, each species of turtles have specialized jaws to accommodate what they eat.

Migration routes of each species can vary from a few hundred miles to thousands of miles.

Sea turtles can live for an incredibly long time. They can live for 80 years or longer!

Females usually nest every two to three years and can usually lay between one and nine nests each season. She can lay anywhere from 50 to 200 eggs in each nest. This guarantees that there will be hatchlings that survive.

The Sea Turtle Lifestyle

Female laying eggs

Sea turtles are probably among the most widely recognized endangered animals on a global scale. All eight species are on the US Endangered and Threatened Wildlife list.

Sea turtles are listed as threatened or endangered because of the destruction of their nesting habitats.

The human impact is great on these turtles. Nesting sites on beaches are becoming harder to find because of human impact. If the beach has lots of trash, females will not lay their eggs there.

Sea turtles also get entangled in fishing nets. They sometimes mistake trash in the ocean for jellyfish or other food. Being exposed to artificial light can confuse and disorient them. They can lose their sense of direction, sometimes resulting in their not being able to sense the ocean when they’re on land.

The Status of Sea Turtles

Finding the escape hatch in a fishing

net

The species that was most affected by the Gulf oil spill in April 2010 was the Kemp’s ridley. These turtles were considered one of the greatest success stories in the endangered species world before the spill. Their numbers had rebounded greatly and they were heading for a bright future.

Oil that washed ashore and into nesting areas weakened the egg shells of unhatched turtles and poisoned or choked hatchlings making their way to the ocean or already in the ocean. Adults that were exposed to oil became weak, sick, and many died after coming in contact with the oil.

One of the most shocking things that happened during the clean-up of the oil was the accidental burning of thousands of sea turtle hatchlings. Boats that were sent out to collect soaked oil booms, also scooped up hundreds or thousands of young turtles. These oil booms were then burned, along with the baby sea turtles.

How the Gulf Oil Spill Affected the Turtles

Finding Food Amidst the Oil

Scientists from many organizations in the US (like NOAA, NASA, and the WWF) have helped sea turtles to survive the tragedy in the Gulf.

One great success story involved NASA biologists, as well as scientists from other organizations, digging up and moving eggs from oil-prone beaches on the Gulf and transporting them to the oil-free beaches and ocean in Florida.

They carefully dug up turtle nests on Gulf beaches, packed the eggs carefully, and transported them to Kennedy Space Center in Florida. After the eggs hatched, the young turtles were released along the east coast of Florida, into non-oil affected water. There were 67 eggs, 22 of which were Kemp’s ridley, the rest loggerheads. Only eleven eggs did not hatch.

What has been done in the Gulf to help?

Releasing Hatchlings into

the Atlantic

The Long-term Effects The recovery will be difficult and it will take years to determine the full

impact that the spill had on the turtles. Kemp’s ridley turtles don’t reach sexual maturity for 10 to 30 years.

Their breeding cycles are also incredibly long, spanning from a few years to a decade between breeding years.

Although the hatchlings were all released safely into the Florida waters, there is no telling where they will end up. By instinct, the ridley’s know that the Gulf is their home. They may stay off the Florida coast, or they may start heading straight back to the Gulf. Nothing can help or hinder these instincts.

A report that was released on January 26 of this year declared that 2010 was the worst year for sea turtles in more two decades.

“….the rate of dead, disabled and diseased sea turtles discovered in the months following the massive spill was four to six times above average.”

Returning to the Sea

As indicated by the WWF, their objectives in their Global Marine Turtle Program are to stop:

“The loss and degradation of critical marine turtle habitats;the negative impact of by catch on marine turtles;

Unsustainable use and illegal trade in marine turtles and turtle products.”

The WWF has been setting up protected nesting areas for young baby sea turtles to nest in peace, and at the same time raising awareness about the issue.

Before the tragic oil spill, the Gulf of Mexico was a perfect example of conservation, as the Kemp’s Ridley Turtle was making a slow comeback in that area thanks to the World Wildlife Fund’s help.

What Your Donation to the WWF Does

Kemp’s Ridley

Why You Should DonateLately, sea turtles have caught the attention of more and

more tourists and unfortunately people are not as careful as they should be. The WWF is committed to informing people about how they need to care for these animals more. When you donate to the World Wildlife Page in favor of sea turtles, every penny goes to saving them. Also, when you donate to our Panda Page, you can be sure your money is going to protecting these wonderful animals’ lives. We’d love to meet our goal or $350 by May.

Want to help these wonderful animals? Please consider donating here. Every dollar counts !

Olive Ridley

http://www.seaworld.org/infobooks/seaturtle/home.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/02/gulf-oil-spill-the-

plight_n_634083.html#s109709&title=undefined

http://www.seaturtles.org/index.php http://www.conserveturtles.org/stctmp.php http://www.aolnews.com/2010/07/19/sea-turtles-and-the-gul

f-oil-spill-a-timeline/http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/28/gulf-oil-spill-turt

les-di_n_814732.html

http://na.oceana.org/sites/default/files/reports/Potential_Impacts_of_Deepwater_Horizon_Oil_Spill_on_Sea_Turtles_FINAL.pdf

http://www.restorethegulf.gov/fish-wildlife/turtles http://www.worldwildlife.org/what/wherewework/coraltrian

gle/WWFBinaryitem10866.pdf

Preston, Elizabeth. “Saving Our Sea Turtles.” Muse Nov/Dec 2010: 8-15

Resources

Title Slide: Baby sea turtle (lower left)-nbbd.com; Green Turtle (lower right)-Natl. Geographic; Loggerhead (upper right)-Natl. Geographic

Slide 2: Hawksbill and Kemp’s Ridley-NOAASlide 3: Leatherback laying eggs-NOAASlide 4: Loggerhead finding the TED (Turtle Excluder

Device) in a fishing net-dep.state.fl.usSlide 5: Kemp’s Ridley finding food in oily water-NOAASlide 6: Setting hatchlings free-NASASlide 7: Sea turtles returning to the sea-NOAASlide 8: Kemp’s Ridley- NOAASlide 9: Olive Ridley-Natl. Geographic

Photo Credits