Some Galápagos Sea Turtles Turn Out to Be Total Homebodies

Keypoints

• Scientists tracked nine yellow-morph green sea turtles with satellite tags
• Tracking lasted between 45 and 418 days
• None of the turtles left the Galápagos Marine Reserve
• Five stayed near one island and four moved between islands
• Researchers still think the females will eventually travel to nest
• The study was published in Frontiers in Amphibian and Reptile Science

Sea turtles are famous for traveling huge distances. So researchers were surprised when some turtles in the Galápagos barely traveled at all.

The team tagged seven males and two females of a type called the yellow-morph green turtle. These turtles are native to the western Pacific, and the Galápagos is the only place where they live alongside the darker green turtles from the eastern Pacific. Green turtles are also the only mostly vegetarian sea turtles.

Scientists expected at least some of them to swim off toward distant waters. Instead, every turtle stayed inside the 198,000 square kilometer marine reserve. Five of them stayed close to the island where they were tagged. The other four moved between islands, especially during the cooler months from April to October.

Why does it matter? It shows that the Galápagos coastal waters are very important feeding homes for these turtles. That gives conservation teams a better idea of which areas need protection.

There is a caveat. Only nine turtles were tracked, and the tags lasted at most 418 days. Female yellow-morph turtles are not known to nest in the Galápagos, so researchers believe they will eventually head back to nesting beaches in the western Pacific. More long term tracking will help answer that.