Why Do Green Sea Turtles Live in Coastal Waters?

Are you interested in sea turtles and wonder about the reasons why green sea turtles live by the coast?

A few different reasons exist as to why green sea turtles live in coastal waters:

• To use shallow water for breathing
• To mate, nest and give birth
• To avoid predators

Some of the answers are certainly more obvious than others, but let us take a comprehensive look in order to give you a full explanation.

Breathing

As you probably know, green sea turtles are certainly not fish. They cannot spend their entire lives underwater and go without breathing for a lifetime. Therefore, being near the coast is conducive to their needs, so that they can get fresh air when they need it. It is simply easier to come up for air in shallow water than in the deep sea.

Birthing and Mating Processes

Perhaps the most important reason why green sea turtles live in coastal waters is because the location is directly related to their mating and reproduction cycles. Once they find their nesting beach, they will mate just off of the shoreline.

After they have finished their mating, they go on the shore to lay their eggs. The entire process takes about two hours. You have probably seen movies where dozens of sea turtle eggs - between 110 and 115 per nesting cycle to be exact - hatch and all head for the sea. These little babies need certain temperatures in order to hatch, which they are not going to get if they were actually in the ocean.

Predators

Occasionally, you might see a green sea turtle come onto the shore and go for a stroll without building a nest. It is not looking for food. It is rare that one would venture onto the shore if it were not going to lay some eggs. However, the reason for this behavior is because the animal might be hiding from a predator. While the sea turtle has legs to walk on land, the predator does not.