If the theory of survival of the fittest is true, then sea turtles are one of the fittest creatures on the Earth. An analysis of the fascinating sea turtle facts reveals that animals are surviving from 100 million years, while dinosaurs, the mammoth creatures became extinct before 60 million years.
Interesting Sea Turtle Facts
Almost six out of the seven sea turtle species are included in the US endangered animals list. Kemps Ridley, loggerhead, hawksbill, olive ridley, and leatherback are the names of sea turtle species.
Sea Turtle Eating Habits
- Eating habits of the sea turtles vary from species to species.
- Generally, they eat sea grass, algae, crustaceans, molluscs, sponges, jellyfishes and other soft bodies animals.
- Green species eats the sea weed, green grass and green algae.
- Hawksbills are an interesting species, in term of the sea turtle facts. They have strong jaws that help them to penetrate into the coral reefs and access the sponges, their favourite food.
- Leatherbacks also reach out for soft bodied prey, as their body is adopted accordingly. It is easy for their throat to swallow the slippery food.
- Loggerheads eat the crabs and other animals with heavy shells.
Habitat of the Sea Turtles
- Sea turtles are found in all the tropical and sub-tropical seas of the world.
- Juvenile sea turtles spend their life in the open sea.
- Adult females come to seashores and shallow waters for laying the eggs.
- Sex of determination of the hatchlings depends upon the temperature of seashore.
- More females are likely to be born in high temperatures and more male in cool temperatures.
- Different species of the turtles practice solitary nesting as well as large group nesting.
- Olive Ridley and Kemp’s Ridley are the famous species that can live in a group of almost 40,000 nests.
- Biologists resolved the Kemp’s Ridley’s sea nestling mystery by watching a 1947 movie by Andres Herrera.
- Interesting Sea Turtle Facts show that dark beaches produce up to 93% females and light beaches produce up to 70% males.
- Few species of Sea Turtles can travel up to 9000 miles in the sea.
- They can dive up to 3000 deep feet in water.
Threats to the Sea Turtles
Sea turtles have got a lot of fascinating facts like Dolphins. But, the animal is threatened species for various reasons.
- A loss of habitat for hatchlings is likely to make the sea turtles extinct.
- Oil spills on the seas-shores are also endangering the lives of sea turtles.
- On seashores, Turtle Excluding Devices are implanted for making sure that turtles escape the trawls.
