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Tuesdays with Turtles – Right Flipperedness Edition

Byoliveridley

Across a population studied by scientists, more turtles preferred to use their right rear flipper rather than their left when laying eggs.The result, published in the journal Behavioural Brain Research, is the first time a species of turtle has found to prefer one limb over another.The discovery adds to growing evidence that even lower vertebrates prefer to use one side of the body more often.Such preference is known by scientists as a “lateralised functional behaviour”, and it usually indicates that an animal's brain function is also lateralised, with one side of the brain dominating control of certain tasks.

via BBC – Earth News – Turtles are ‘right-flippered’.

Ha, just when you thought Tuesdays with Turtles was gone, it is Tuesday (here in Canada) and a sea turtle post. Turns out, leatherbacks, the biggest of ths sea turtles and critically endangered tend to be right flippered while on land and laying eggs. A slight predilection to right sidedness runs all the way down to reptiles. It is 54%-46%, which does not seem like much, but the report indicates that among humans, it is the same once you control for a cultural right hand bias!

Anyway, got to love those sexy beasts, even if they’re right flippered, right Ned?

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    The Blue Marble: Indian Crocodiles Guard Dwindling Forests

    Byoliveridley

    This is an interesting and good side effect of releasing captive bred crocodiles back into the wild.

    The Blue Marble: Indian Crocodiles Guard Dwindling Forests

    Dozens of crocodiles bred in captivity in eastern India are protecting their endangered counterparts. Newly released into the wild, these giants are scaring away poachers bent on illegal fishing and timber harvesting in mangrove forests in the states of Orissa and West Bengal, reports Reuters. The disappearing mangroves have led to a steep decline in wild croc numbers, from several thousand a century ago to less than 100 in the early 1970s. But the same species has bred well in captivity and is now being used to solve its own problem. “The swelling number of released crocodiles in the wild is working as a deterrent and keeping people away from the mangrove as villagers are more cautious before venturing into the forests,” said Rathin Banerjee, a senior wildlife official. “Unlike guard dogs, crocodiles cannot be tamed and are ferocious and can attack anyone in the swamps.” .

  • Tuesdays with Turtles – Must See TV Edition

    Byoliveridley

    PBS is showing a nature film following a loggerhead turtle on a looooooong journey.

    Nature . TV Schedule | PBS

    Voyage of the Lonely Turtle
    Sunday, April 15, 8:00pm
    CHANNEL 4 (UNC-TV)

    F. Murray Abraham narrates this account of a 30-year-old female loggerhead turtle’s journey from Mexico to Japan (its birthplace) to lay eggs. During the yearlong trip (travel speed: 1mph), she passes an array of marine creatures, including blue whales.

    Here’s a press release on the show, sounds great, don’t forget to watch (or record!): April 15th at 8:00 PM.

  • Tuesdays with Turtles – Wednesday Edition

    Byoliveridley

    Where I’m a day late and a dollar short. It turns out that the Mediterranean sea is awash with plastic and most of the loggerheads there have swallowed plastic bags. So, the next time you’re out looking for loggerhead nests and find one in which all the eggs have been double bagged, do not be surprised! Now. if they start swallowing egg cartons…

    Mediterranean drowning in a hidden sea of plastic rubbish – Independent Online Edition > Europe

    A recent study of the endangered loggerhead turtle off Spain’s Mediterranean coast found that 75 per cent of them had swallowed plastic bags. Mr Rodriguez said: “We have to understand the sea is not a tip; it will constantly return to us what we throw in.”

    Seriously, plastic bags need to go away.

  • Small-Scale Fisheries Bycatch Jeopardizes Loggerheads

    Byoliveridley

    35AA810F-45DF-436A-B609-5EF72D09CC9B.jpg

    This is almost a 1000 juveniles killed in a year in Baja California alone. The authors mention that over 99% of all fisherpeople are employed in small scale fisheries, which surprised me.

    PLoS ONE: Small-Scale Fisheries Bycatch Jeopardizes Endangered Pacific Loggerhead Turtles:

    Although bycatch of industrial-scale fisheries can cause declines in migratory megafauna including seabirds, marine mammals, and sea turtles, the impacts of small-scale fisheries have been largely overlooked. Small-scale fisheries occur in coastal waters worldwide, employing over 99% of the world’s 51 million fishers. New telemetry data reveal that migratory megafauna frequent coastal habitats well within the range of small-scale fisheries, potentially producing high bycatch. These fisheries occur primarily in developing nations, and their documentation and management are limited or non-existent, precluding evaluation of their impacts on non-target megafauna.

    This is a surprising and unexpected finding because you would expect smaller fishing boats to have smaller impacts. I guess smaller scale fishing fleets in Mexico (and other developing nations) have not been targeted for education, awareness and enforcement of turtle safe fishing practices.

    The good news from the study is that a major source of mortality has been identified and the authors point to recent efforts to increase awareness in the community about turtle safe fishing. But it will be a long and hard fight to be tackled all over the world.

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    Tuesdays with Turtles – Wednesday Hook Edition

    Byoliveridley

    WWF – Fishing Technology That’s Letting Turtles Off the Hook –

    Turns out that a small change in hook design can save a lot of turtles from getting caught in longline hooks. But the story’s not really about the shape of the hook. I’ve written about this before. The issue is rarely one of technology. The solutions have been developed and exist because a lot of work has gone into developing technological solutions. Implementation on the ground (or sea!) has lagged because it is much harder to effect change where it counts when you attempt to impose technology in a top-down fashion. Small scale fishers (new english here, to avoid the whole fishermen/fisherwoman/fisherperson nonsense, take out the gender specific suffix to every occupation describing verb! – Try it, it’s not weldman, or plumbwoman!) are in a world of hurt with declining fish stocks and widespread fisheries piracy by the so called “developed world”. Without developing and implementing the solution with the full participation of the people who have the most potential to be affected, the change will not be successful.

    What did the WWF do differently this time?

    Together with fishermen we are building a culture for sustainable fishing practices that will guarantee fish stocks in the long term

    They emphasized the people, not the solution. And the results were great, 90% reduction in turtle catch, >95% of the turtles caught were released safely, and the fish yields were not affected. Everyone wins, right?

    Good stuff. Those turtles are still endangered and we’ll run out of wild edible fish in 50 years, but hey, more like this and there’s a bit of hope.

  • Tuesdays with Turtles – Archie Carr Edition

    Byoliveridley

    Archie Carr is considered the father of modern sea turtle research. And now, there’s a book about him about to come out. It’s called “The Man who Saved Sea Turtles”.

    Well, I guess saved is going a little too far. I would have said “postponed the extinction of”, given the imminent extinction of the Pacific leatherback. But hey, forget about the title, I am sure it’s going to be a good book to read.

    Oxford University Press: The Man Who Saved Sea Turtles: Frederick R. Davis

    Archie Carr, one of the greatest biologists of the twentieth century, played a leading part in finding a new and critical role for natural history and systematics in a post-1950s world dominated by the glamorous science of molecular biology. With the rise of molecular biology came a growing popular awareness of species extinction. Carr championed endangered sea turtles, and his work reflects major shifts in the study of ecology and evolution. A gifted nature writer, his books on the natural history of sea turtles and their habitats in Florida, the Caribbean, and Africa entertained and educated a wide audience. Carr’s conservation ethic grew from his field work as well as his friendships with the fishermen who supplied him with many of the stories he retold so engagingly. With Archie Carr as the focus, The Man Who Saved Sea Turtles explores the evolution of the naturalist tradition, biology, and conservation during the twentieth century.