The
beaches in the Gandoca-Manzanillo National Wildlife Refuge (GMNWR) in
southeastern Costa Rica are known to host nesting critically endangered
hawksbill sea turtles (<i>Eretmochelys
imbricata</i>). The spatial ecology and movement behaviors of this nesting
population has never been observed. Evaluating the spatial ecology of nesting
sea turtles allows for a better understanding of their local movement behavior
as well as their large scale oceanic movements that inform conservation needs.
Satellite tracks reveal internesting, postnesting migration, and foraging
behaviors for four nesting hawksbills from the GMNWR. During the internesting behavior,
satellite-tracked hawksbills remained in the coastal waters near the nesting
beach for 15 to 55 days before making their postnesting migration. Home-range
areas occupied by internesting hawksbills vary between 21.9 and 557.9 km<sup>2</sup>.
Hawksbill internesting high use areas overlapped with the marine boundary of
the GMNWR for an average of 29% of time spent inside the refuge. The beginning
of all four turtle’s migrations start with a pelagic circular movement away
from the coast into the Caribbean Sea before resuming a northern coastal
migration pattern. Migration routes varied in length from 662 to 1,486 km and
passed through three or four exclusive economic zones of various neighboring
nations. Foraging areas of three hawksbills were situated east of Nicaragua and
one was found along the northern coast of Honduras, near Roatan. Foraging home-range
areas of satellite-tracked hawksbills varied from 205.1 to 696.1 km<sup>2</sup>.
This is the second satellite telemetry study completed on nesting hawksbills in
the Costa Rican Caribbean and the first for GMNWR. These results display the
use of pelagic and coastal migratory routes for the critically endangered
hawksbill. Distant foraging grounds utilized by hawksbills nesting in Costa
Rica reveal the importance for the preservation of the Miskito Cays and nearby
ecosystems.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:purdue.edu/oai:figshare.com:article/8291960 |
| Date | 16 October 2019 |
| Creators | Quintin D Bergman (6853298) |
| Source Sets | Purdue University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis |
| Rights | CC BY 4.0 |
| Relation | https://figshare.com/articles/Spatial_Ecology_of_Hawksbill_Turtles_Eretmochelys_imbricata_Nesting_at_Gandoca-Manzanillo_National_Wildlife_Refuge_Costa_Rica/8291960 |
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