With a team of collaborators, we tested new specially-designed prototypes of Lotek microsatellite tags on 160 juvenile sea turtles of four species in the North Atlantic. The data from these tags was published in a new article, "Novel Microsatellite Tags Hold Promise for Illuminating the Lost Years in Four Sea Turtle Species." We sat down with lead-author Tony Candela to talk about this article, his process as lead-author, and the important implications of these findings for the bio-logging community.
When fishermen and researchers collaborate, they create opportunities to amplify efforts for the research and conservation of sea turtles. This past spring, Upwell participated in these efforts by providing a satellite tag for Liam Neythan, a leatherback sea turtle that was saved in Sinaloa, Mexico. Our collaborators, the fishers Edmundo Rafael Garcías Burgos and Mariano García Olivas, as well as Dr. Alan Zavala Norzagaray and the CIIDIR IPN Unidad Sinaloa are the key collaborators and heroes in this story.
Upwell Research Project Technician Sierra Fullmer shares some of her most exciting sightings while conducting aerial surveys to look for leatherbacks off of the US West Coast.
Most sea turtle species migrate and spend large amounts of their life history in areas of the ocean considered “high seas.” The high seas are the parts of the ocean that are not under the jurisdiction of any nation. In June of 2023, after almost two decades of negotiations, UN Member states adopted the Biodiversity in Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction treaty (also known as the High Seas Treaty) to provide a coherent and holistic framework for protecting the high seas. Earlier this month, Upwell Executive Director Dr. George Shillinger attended the High Seas Treaty symposium to learn more about how its implementation may impact sea turtle populations and to seek opportunities to further the protection of turtles at sea.
The new publication "Incorporating multidimensional behavior into a risk management tool for a critically endangered and migratory species," takes a look at how data on leatherback diving behavior can be used to improve the South Pacific TurtleWatch tool aimed at reducing bycatch.
West Pacific Leatherbacks on the US West Coast
Nerea Lezama-Ochoa is a marine biologist working as a UCSC project scientist at the NOAA Environmental Science Division in Monterey. Her team is producing daily projections of suitable habitat for 10 highly migratory species (including leatherback sea turtles). Read Nerea’s blog about how these projections are created with accuracy and why they are helpful to conservation efforts.
Since 2021, John Douglas has worked with Upwell as captain of the Sheila B. research vessel while monitoring for leatherback sea turtles in the Pacific Northwest. The Sheila B. is a boat that has been specially engineered for the research work that it carries out. In this blog, John gives us insight into its history and its evolution into the perfect vessel for leatherback sea turtle monitoring.
In October of 2021, Upwell and our partners from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) tagged one of the largest leatherbacks ever encountered in the California Current foraging zone weighing in at 1,419 pounds! This massive male leatherback was dubbed “Bumpy” because of the distinctive bumps on the rear of his carapace, which were likely caused by a prior ship strike. Find out more about where Bumpy has traveled.
Learn about the female turtle tagged by NOAA and Upwell in 2020 whose transmitter is still reporting. She was tagged in September 2019, and she returned to same area where she was tagged in the Gulf of the Farallones this year on 31 July 2020. It’s exciting when we see one of these movement records close the loop! Additional leatherback sightings in the Monterey Bay have been reported recently.
At the turn of the millennium, the origin of leatherback turtles in California waters was unproven. Many assumed they originated from nesting beaches in Mexico or Costa Rica; few could have imagined the extent of their travels across the entire Pacific Ocean. We know now that West Pacific leatherbacks only make their epic trans-Pacific migration about every three to five years. Unfortunately, the batteries on early satellite tags didn’t last long enough to track their whole migration.
