Large Female Sea Turtles Lay More Eggs and Need to Be Protected: Study

A female green sea turtle, injured by a probable boat strike and brought to Oceanworld Manly, near Sydney, is measured by a vet nurse on May 23, 2012.GREG WOOD/AFP/GettyImages

The size of female sea turtles has a bearing on population dynamics and therefore they should be protected, a University of Western Australia (UWA) study has found.

The finding, published in Global Ecology and Biogeography on April 19, showed that larger females have greater reproductive output, with size a strong predictor of egg quantities, as well as the size of hatchlings when born.