Missing Hawksbill Turtles Found Hiding in Mangroves

Hawksbill turtles in the eastern Pacific Ocean have eluded scientists for decades, and now researchers know why—they have been searching in the wrong place.
Missing Hawksbill Turtles Found Hiding in Mangroves
9/5/2011
Updated:
10/24/2015

Hawksbill turtles in the eastern Pacific Ocean have eluded scientists for decades, and now researchers know why—they have been searching in the wrong place.

The turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata) are hunted for their beautiful shells and their eggs. Coupled with the destruction of their coastal habitats and accidental capture by fisheries, their numbers have declined to the brink of extinction.

Populations of the critically endangered reptiles are distributed world-wide along Atlantic and Indo-Pacific coastlines. Historically, they have been known to inhabit open-coast coral and rocky reefs, but a recent study has revealed populations in the eastern Pacific are living in mangrove forests in inshore estuaries.

“We were really shocked to see that adult hawksbills weren’t even using coral or rocky reefs or any habitats that were even remotely similar to habitats they associate with in other parts of the world,” says lead author Alexander Gaos at San Diego State University in a Conservation International press release.

With the help of fishermen and even illegal egg collectors, the researchers were able to find and attach satellite trackers to 12 female hawksbills in Central and South America to study their habitat use.

“Our findings highlight the variability in life-history strategies that marine turtles and other wide-ranging marine wildlife may exhibit among ocean regions and the importance of understanding such disparities from an ecological and management perspective,” the scientists write in the study abstract.

Conservationists hope this discovery will help organizations such as the Iniciativa Carey del Pacifico Oriental (ICAPO) broaden the scope of projects aimed at protecting the species.

“Where some have been found already, many more might be hidden away, still escaping detection by us,” says Gaos.

“That tells us that the ICAPO network needs to continue thinking outside the box and working together to solve these mysteries, focusing in areas where hawksbills haven’t traditionally flourished, but are surviving anyway.”

The study appears in the Aug. 31 online edition of Biology Letters.