Hawaii is one of the only places on earth where divers and swimmers can spend time close up to these amazing creatures. Sea turtles have been swimming our oceans for a very long time, but in much of the world’s tropic waters humans still eat them.
In Hawaii sea turtles have been fully protected by the federal Endangered Species Act for many years, and they have become so comfortable and used to people that they usually just ignore us.
In Hawaii the main sea turtle we see is the green sea turtle, but we also have the rare hawksbill turtle here. These turtles can grow to over 300 pounds and live for over a 100 years.
Sea turtles are reptiles and they breath air. They can stay underwater for longer then 30 minutes at a time where they feed on limu (seaweed). They sleep out on the reef by taking short naps underwater, but will also crawl up on a sandy beach to sleep and dry out their shells to kill the algae that grows on them.
Sea turtles’ shells are actually modified backbones on top (carapace) and modified ribs on the bottom (plastron) that fused together to form the solid, rock-hard shell. The female turtle has a flat shell on the bottom and a short tail. The male turtle has a long tail and a concave bottom shell.
Sea turtles lay eggs every few years up on the beach, where they dig a hole to find the right temperature and humidity for their eggs to incubate. A turtle egg is not hard like a chicken egg, and as the eggs mature they grow in size due to the moisture in the sand. After a few months the baby turtles hatch, dig up out of the sand and make their way down to the sea.
For the first five or so years of their lives the young sea turtles live way offshore in the open ocean and eat jellyfish. Once they grow to about 18 to 20 inches long they make their way back to shore to feed on seaweed like the adults.
The young sea turtles that just returned to the near shore environment are usually a much lighter color then the adults because they lack the coating of algae that will grow on them living close to shore. Some of our resident sea turtles here in Kauai swim all the way to the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, over 1,000 miles away, just to find the perfect beach to lay their eggs on.
We all need to treat our honu with a great deal of respect, as they were here in Hawaii long before us humans arrived. It is illegal to come too close to the sea turtles, touch or harass them in any way. The only real enemy of the adult sea turtles here in Hawaii are the large tiger sharks that sometimes eat them, and boaters going too fast that run over them and break their shells.
You can see my 45-minute educational movie I did on sea turtles that is featured up on my web at www.underwater2web.com, and also follow my daily marine-life studies and pictures on Instagram at terry.lilley.
