Sea Turtles

Contents

Eggs Growing up Dangers in the sea Adults

Published introduction

Over 150 million years ago, along with the dinosaurs, there lived a species of sea turtles.  They have managed to survive longer than many other animals from the Jurassic period.  However, only 10% of sea turtles live to breeding age.  Now that humans have come along, only 1% of all sea turtles survive to breed the new generation of baby sea turtles.

Eggs

Published eggs

The mother sea turtle digs a nesting pit high on the beach and the eggs get carefully placed into the pit by the mother. The eggs are leathery and about the size of ping pong balls. The mother lays about 50-200 eggs. 20% will not hatch.The mother sea turtle lays about 1000 eggs a year.Sea turtles lay over 68,040kgs of eggs in the sand.

Growing up

Published Growing up

Once the eggs are laid and have hatched, they are about the size of a hand. They then have to squirm desperately towards the surf but along the way there are many dangers such as crabs, birds, rubbish and holes. By this point 50% have not survived. In the first few days of life, they will swim underneath a patch of floating seaweed.

Adults

Published Adults

2 sea turtles survive to breeding age without human interference. It takes 2 decades for them to be able to breed. Through the passage of years they become the size of a dinner table. The width that they are when they are adults, they don’t have to worry about getting eaten so much.

Danger in the sea

Published Dangers in the sea

When they are small, their predators will most likely to be fish , dolphins , sharks and seabirds when they come up to breathe. They will also experience challenging weather and rough unfortunate sea currents. When they are adults the predators are bigger, like, sharks as in, great whites and bull sharks. Not likely to happen, but they might get eaten by a killer whale.

Blurb

The sea turtles have been around since the late jurassic, roughly 150 000 000 million years ago and they have an extremely hard life. A sea turtle breed named the archelon is already extinct 1000 eggs a year, 800 hatch, 400 make it to the water, 200 progress toward adulthood, 20 survive to breeding age without human interference, 2 survive to breeding age with human interference.

Glossary

survive - continue to live or exist while in spite of danger of hardship squirm - wiggle or twist from side to side desperately - in a way that shows despair decades - 10 years late jurassic - dinosaur ages

Credits

Written by: Hunter, Archie, Sarah and Charlotte Edited by: Hunter, Archie, Sarah and Charlotte