Monday Sea Turtle Blogging

Chronicle's blog has a link to the Great Sea Turtle race, a two week tracking of leatherback sea turtles as they migrate from two starting locations, the pacific southwest and California, to the final destination of the international dateline. They all have adorable illustrations and histories. I signed up to be watching Jingjing, the turtle sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The whole thing is designed to bring attention to global warming and how it affects sea turtles (the following information is adapted from the Great Turtle Race website.

1. As sea levels rise, nesting beaches disappear.
2. There will be no more male sea turtles. Since sea turtle gender is determined by temperature and not genetics, sea turtles born in warm weather are females. Now, most of the sea turtles hatched at Playa Grande in Costa Rica are female, meaning eventually sea turtles will become extinct.
3. As coral dies, sea turtles lose their means of gathering food. Food supplies diminish, and the turtles starve.