Sea Turtle Habitat

Sea Turtle Habitat and Distribution

Sea turtles are known to be distributed in many places around the world, except the polar regions. They prefer the tropic and sub tropics temperatures. They are found along the coastal regions of sandy beaches. This includes areas of North America, South America, Central America, India, South Africa, and Australia. They have also been spotted in the Atlantic Ocean by Canada and even in areas around Europe.

Occasionally, sea turtles will be found in strange locations. Researchers wonder if they got confused during migration. Perhaps they were in a fishing net and turned loose far from their natural habitat. Others believe it has to do with global warming and the search for food. Since sea turtles are loners these are often isolated incidents were one or two sea turtles are identified.

Some sea turtles are known to live in the colder waters, but it is often due to necessity. For example when they can’t find enough food to survive on in their natural habitat they may venture further than they did in the past to locate it. You will also find that sea turtles travel through the colder waters when they migrate.

The migration process for sea turtles is very fascinating. They can travel several miles for mating. They will return to the sandy beach where they were hatched to deposit their own eggs. It doesn’t matter how long that journey is from their current location. The problem though is that if they return to that habitat to lay their eggs and it has been destroyed by humans, they simply won’t be laying any eggs. That means the population of sea turtles is going to be adversely affected.

Not all sea turtles migrate though as their location to deposit eggs may be very close to where they permanently reside. There is plenty of variation out there among sea turtles when it comes to migration. You may assume that such differences are due to various species. However, even the same species of sea turtles are known to behave differently in this regard.

When they aren’t migrating, sea turtles are content to live in a given location. They will travel around a certain area looking for food. The home area of a sea turtle will commonly overlap with that of many others. While they are loners so they don’t group together, the don’t seem to mind sharing the territory with other sea turtles.

Where you will find the sea turtles in the water really depends on their age. For example the adult sea turtles are commonly found in shallow waters including bays and lagoons. They can also be found in the open sea as many of the species can dive deep down into the water to find food.

It is believed that the younglings are to stay in areas of the coral reef for a at least the first year of life. Very little is known about them during this period of time and researchers still aren’t 100% positive that is where they reside. It is like these newly hatched sea turtles simply disappear without a trace for at least a year and then they move closer to the shoreline.

With the sea turtles being so distributed it is difficult to really know just how many of them are really out there. This makes it very hard to get additional conservation efforts in place at a government level in various countries. The fact that the natural habitats of the sea turtles continue to be destroyed though is a serious problem to be aware of. The number of them is dropping and if such trends continue they will be extinct in about 50 years according to the predictions of experts.