First Atlantic satellite tracks of lost years green turtles support the importance of the Sargasso Sea as a sea turtle nursery

• Main Authors: Mansfield, Katherine, Wyneken, Jeanette, Luo, Jiangang
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: Zenodo 2021
• Subjects: satellite telemetry; Sargasso Sea; sea turtle nursery; sea turtle developmental habitat; Sea turtle lost years; Chelonia mydas; North Atlantic
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.x95x69ph9

In-water behaviour and long-term movements of oceanic-stage juvenile sea turtles are not well described or quantified. This is due to technological or logistical limitations of tracking small, fast-growing animals across long distances and time-periods within marine habitats. Here we present the first long-term offshore tracks of oceanic green turtles ( Chelonia mydas ) in western North Atlantic waters. Using a tag attachment technique developed specifically for young (<1 year old) green turtles, we satellite tracked 21 oceanic-stage green turtles (<19 cm straight carapace length) up to 152 days using small, solar-powered transmitters. We verify that oceanic-stage green turtles: ( i ) travel to and remain within oceanic waters; ( ii ) often depart the Gulf Stream and North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre currents, orienting toward waters associated with the Sargasso Sea; ( iii ) remain at the sea surface, using thermally-beneficial habitats that promote growth and survival of young turtles; and ( iv ) green turtles orient differently compared to same stage loggerhead turtles ( Caretta caretta ). Combined with satellite tracks of oceanic-stage loggerhead turtles, our work identifies the Sargasso Sea as an important nursery habitat for North Atlantic sea turtles, supporting a growing body of research that suggests oceanic-stage sea turtles are behaviourally more complex than previously assumed. Please contact data owner for additional details if needed. Loggerhead file: Turtle ID refers to the unique tag identifying number assigned to indivirual turtles GMT: Greenwich Mean Time Local: Greenwich Mean Time converted to local time (local meaning the location of the turtle at the time the latitude and longitude was received). Green turtle file: tag_id: refers to the unique tag identifying number assigned to indivirual turtles UTC: refers to Coordinated Universal Time (and date) for each location (latitude and longitude) received by the tags. lc: refers to ARGOS/CLS America location codes for each loccation receoved ...