Amazing Navigation Skills in Young Loggerhead Sea Turtles

A baby loggerhead making its way to the sea. Image courtesy of Hillebrand Steve, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Public domain.



Joel Kontinen

Young loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) can swim against tides to get to their preferred destination, new research shows.

Katherine Mansfield (University of Central Florida in Orlando) and her colleagues monitored the movements of 19 young loggerheads via satellite-tracking tags. They released the turtles into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Brazil.

In a few months the tiny animals swam some 4,350 kilometres. They mostly followed seasonal currents but would also swim against the ocean currents.

Darwinian mechanisms can hardly explain the loggerheads’ amazing skills.

They are not the only marine animals that display such prowess. Jellyfish share their ability.

Turtles present another major dilemma for Darwinism. These living fossils have resisted evolution for “230 million” years.

Source:

Mansfield, Katherine L et al. 2017. First satellite tracks of South Atlantic sea turtle ‘lost years’: seasonal variation in trans-equatorial movement. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 284 (1868) (6 December).