text x_quick_Title2=Class: Reptilia~Order: Testudines~Family: Cheloniidae~(Chelonia mydas)
text x_quick=Where In the World~` The green sea turtle is found around the world in oceans where the water temperature doesn't fall below 68 degrees F (which is 20 degrees C). ~` Usually, green sea turtles are found in tropical waters, but during the warmest months, they have been seen rarely along North American coasts as far north as New England on the east coast and the southern parts of Alaska on the west coast.~` Their population is unknown, but it is definitely declining at an alarming rate.~ ~Take a Look!~` The larger green sea turtles can be up to four feet long, and can weigh 450 pounds. There are records of green sea turtles that have weighed up to a thousand pounds!~` Males tend to be a bit longer than females and are somewhat narrower. Males also have tails that are much longer than the females have.~` Baby turtles (called hatchlings) are black. Adults can be from light to dark olive-brown, with brown or grey-black skin.~` Instead of feet, green sea turtles have strong flippers. The front flippers in particular are designed for long-distance swimming.~ ~All in the Family~` The green sea turtle is related to the other sea turtles, including the hawksbill, the leatherback, and the Ridley sea turtle.~ ~Just the Facts~` Green sea turtles are fast and graceful in the water - they can swim up to 18 miles in an hour. (That's about as fast as many people can run for long periods.)~` The front flippers of the green sea turtle are shaped like the blades of an oar. These flippers do the power work of swimming, while the back flippers are used like a rudder to help the turtle steer.~` Because they are so fast in the water, green sea turtles can rely on their speed to protect them from danger. Unlike most land turtles, a green sea turtle can't tuck its head into its shell for safety.~` Green sea turtles love to swim in the ocean - but they also love to bask in the sun. If they can find a really private place, the turtles will haul out of the water to sunbathe on a rock ledge or lonely beach.~` While it is designed to be quick and graceful in the water, those strong flippers mean that the green sea turtle is slow and awkward on land. The only time a green sea turtle moves above the high tide mark on a beach is when the female goes ashore to lay her eggs in the sand.~` The female green sea turtle scoops out a nest in the sand and lays over a hundred eggs - then she returns to the ocean. Her children hatch and move to water without her help.~` The green sea turtle can swim amazing distances. Sometimes the best beaches for laying eggs are far away from the best places to eat ocean grasses, so some green sea turtles swim more than a thousand miles in one season.~` Every two or three years, adult green sea turtles return to the same beach where they were hatched.~They always lay their eggs on the beach where they were born.~` Young turtles eat plants and animals, including sponges, jellyfish, and small mollusks (such as clams) and crustaceans (like shrimp). Adults pretty~much prefer plants, and munch happily on ocean grasses.~` It's hard to tell how long the average green sea turtle lives in the wild, but some have lived for more than 20 years in captivity.
;Habitat
text x_hab= Green sea turtles are found in tropical waters all around the world. In the United States, they are found along the Gulf of Mexico, in Florida, and up the east coast to North Carolina. (Once, they were seen as far north as the New England states.) The ones that live in the Pacific Ocean are usually a bit smaller than the ones that live in the Atlantic. Green sea turtles swim in the Pacific waters off Mexico and in parts of California. Once, they were seen as far north as southern Alaska, helped by the warm North Pacific and Alaskan currents.~ Green sea turtles can swim through open, deep ocean with great skill and speed - a green sea turtle can swim 18 miles an hour, and migrating green sea turtles have travelled over 400 miles in just a month. When they aren't migrating to their nesting beaches, they are found in shallow water where beds of ocean grasses grow in the tropical sunlight.~ A perfect turtle beach has well-drained sand and steady, stable temperatures. It should be free of human intervention and, because the hatchlings run towards the brightest light (usually the ocean, which reflects any light), a good nesting beach should be far from any electric streetlights, neon signs, or other bright things that would distract the hatchlings and lead them away from the safety of the ocean.
;Food
text x_eat= Green sea turtles have a jaw that's adapted to ripping up sea grasses. (Usually, green sea turtles are gentle and slow to anger, but they can use those strong beaks to give quite a powerful bite should they become annoyed.) Adult green sea turtles mostly eat plants, including sea grasses, algae, and the roots and leaves of mangrove trees. Apparently, nothing tastes quite as good to the sea turtles as the roots of these plants.~ The young sea turtles eat more animals than their elders do. They eat plants, too, but they also eat crustaceans (such as shrimp), mollusks (which are shellfish - like clams and mussels), sponges, and jellyfish.~ The plants that the sea turtles eat have most of the nutrients the turtles need, except they're short on vitamin D. But sea turtles (just like humans) can get vitamin D by basking in the sunlight. The need for vitamin D may explain why the green sea turtle likes to sunbathe on rock ledges or quiet beaches for a while - while it's basking in the sun, its body is storing up an important vitamin. That's sure to make the green sea turtle feel healthier.
;Habits and Characteristics
text x_life= Green sea turtles are amazing navigators - and they really confuse scientists, because no one knows how these turtles navigate so well. Here's an example: ~ Look on the map at the Atlantic Ocean, just below the equator. There's a tiny island in the middle of nowhere called Ascension Island. To find it, find the little country of Guinea-Bissau on the map of Africa - it's on the west coast just where the continent begins to slim down. Draw an imaginary line straight down to the south, over the equator until you're opposite the bulgiest, most eastward-part of Brazil. And that's where Ascension Island is. It's a lonely, rocky place with not much on it - except it just happens to have some very nice beaches where a green sea turtle might like to lay its eggs.~ And the green sea turtles that want to lay their eggs there usually feed on the sea grasses just off the coast of Brazil, about three thousand miles away. (The reason they want to lay their eggs there is because that's where they were born. Green sea turtles\
always return to the beaches where they were hatched.) So, before it's time to mate, these sea turtles on the coast of Brazil set off on a phenomenal journey, swimming through the deepest oceans and across strong currents that try to sweep the turtle off it's path. Somehow, the sea turtles find that tiny island, just 34 square miles, where they were born years before.~ Are they navigating by the stars, as ancient ocean-going humans learned to do? Scientists say no - if that were so, they'd be defeated by cloudy weather. Besides, sea turtles have eyes that are designed to see well under water. Above the surface, they can't see well at all. Are they following currents? Well, the predominant current in the area sweeps from Ascension towards Brazil, so it would help on the ride back, but would actually make life harder on the way out. Are they using the earth's magnetic forces to analyse true north and south? Perhaps. Now, scientists think its possible that the green sea turtles might be smelling Ascension Island and following a scent path across thousands of miles of open ocean.~ However they're doing it, the sea turtles all around the world find their way back to the beaches where they were born. Both males and females m
