Photo Research in Action jeanette-wyneken

How Weather Affects Sea Turtle Nests

Jeanette Wyneken, Ph.D.
Professor of Biological Sciences and Director, FAU Marine Lab at Gumbo Limbo Environmental Complex


What can be done to help lower the nest temperatures? Anything that we can do to help? By we, I mean Gumbo Limbo and scientists as well as volunteers and people.
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During excessively hot years, with minimal rain, would it make sense to erect a "tent cover" to cool the nest somewhat, and make it easier on the boys?
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Is there a significant difference in the temperature: female ratio in DC (leatherback) and CM (green turtle) nests compared to the shallower CC (loggerhead) nests, or are you just doing your study on CC (loggerhead) nests?
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What is it about turtles that compels you to study them?
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Do you do any intervention by removing eggs and putting them in a controlled environment?
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How many nests on average are being studied each season? What percentage of total nests are being studied?
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How long do sea turtles live?
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We found your stakes after the last hurricane. Where do we return them the next time this happens?
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Is it true that all sea turtles return to where they were born to nest?
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Would you be allowed to remove the eggs from the nests if there is a large storm?
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How does the increased amount of females born impact opportunities for finding male mates? Can males mate with multiple females?
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How old do you have to be to volunteer at the FAU Marine Lab?
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You briefly mentioned the defects in the hatchlings. Can you describe these defects?
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Is the temperature causing the unhatched sea turtles to change sex or is it because males have lower survival rates in high temps?
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Do you manipulate the temperatures of the turtles on the lab areas?
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Do we know if rainfall would be better during the beginning on ending of the nesting time?
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How do you determine the sex of a hatchling?
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What ratio of adult male/female can maintain the population?
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Have there been observations of shifting nesting times associated with a changing climate?
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Do you track the baby turtles in the ocean? If so, how?
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How long can they reproduce?
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Are scientists considering nests being carefully moved and then temperature manipulated to create all male hatchlings to ensure a stronger male population?
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If you were a turtle what turtle would you be?
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Does acid rain effect the eggs differently?
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Do turtles have scales on them?
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Other than loggerheads, which sea turtles were your favorite to work with?
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How old were you when you really wanted to become a biologist?
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How can you tell which species the turtle is when you are looking at a turtle nest?
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As a management tool, has consideration been given to moving nests farther north so they would ultimately return to those northern areas to nest themselves?
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What do you do if you catch poachers in the act?
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How will everyone staying home affect sea turtle nesting rates?
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What do they eat and is their food sources impacted by current warmer environmental conditions?
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If you were a turtle what turtle would you be?
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Is there a relationship between nest temperature and sex?
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There are some early nests of leatherbacks in February on Hutchinson Island and some other places this year, how many males would you expect to come out these nests?
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How many sample nests does the sex ratio graph represent?
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In a perfect world, what is their lifespan?
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How are you mitigating adverse environmental impacts?
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What is a drown nest?
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What’s your favorite turtle?
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Are sea turtles “tied” to the areas they hatched? Do they only return to nest to the beaches they hatched on, or might they nest further north as the weather warms?
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Although it is already looking like a hot summer, do you think that the fact that less people are on the beach will give them a fighting chance?
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How many nests do you have on record for this year?
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Do you move a nest once you observe it is above the thermal maximum to try and save the embryos? Or is that a more risky option?
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Are fellow scientists around the world seeing the same results? Perhaps there are microclimates that are not exhibiting the same conditions?
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Do loggerheads nest in the Bahamas? Where do the other proportion of loggerheads in the Atlantic nest?
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What can we as lay people do to help preserve all species' habitat?
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Is it true that the closed beaches have changed the turtles’ behavior?
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Do they have to sun bath?
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