Biodiversity / Food / Water

November 29, 2003

 

Green Sea Turtle Lays Eggs in Indoor Aquarium--A World First

Keywords: Ecosystems / Biodiversity Local government 

At 8.40 p.m. on September 12, 2003, a green sea turtle kept in the circular aquarium for sea turtle at the Port of Nagoya Public Aquarium laid eggs on artificial sands adjacent to the water tank. It was the world's first time a green turtle laid eggs in an indoor environment.

On September 13, the keepers dug out the eggs and found 117 of them. These eggs were transferred to an artificial incubation ground in the turtle breeding research facility in another building to await hatching about two months later. Subsequently, the same green sea turtle laid eggs again on September 26. This time, 100 eggs were found the next day and were transferred to the artificial incubation ground.

Green sea turtles live in tropical and subtropical seas, and mainly feed on marine algae (such as agar-agar) and seaweed (such as turtle grass).The breeding turtle, caught in the warm ocean near Indonesia, was brought to Japan on May 13, 1992 for academic research. The turtle is 87 cm long across the shell, and 102 kg in weight.

The aquarium succeeded in the world's first indoor breeding of the loggerhead sea turtle on an artificial beach in 1995. In 2003, the Aquarium began a long-term joint study with the sea turtle research division of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to study the migration path of loggerhead sea turtles in the Pacific Ocean.



Posted: 2003/11/29 09:57:39 AM
Japanese version

 

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