olive+riddley+sea+turtle

The name of our endangered species is the Olive Ridley Sea Turtle. The scientific name for it is Lepidochelys olivacea. The physical description media type="custom" key="7574953" align="center"

is that the Olive Ridley has a heart shaped shell and when they are babies their shell is a grey color, but when they are adults there shell turns a nice olive green color. Also, they have two visible claws on each of their paddle-like flippers. The behavior of the Olive Ridley is mostly carnivorous, feeding on such creatures as jellyfish, snails, crabs, and shrimp. They will occasionally eat algae and seaweed as well. Hatchlings, most of which perish before reaching the ocean, are preyed on by crabs, raccoons, pigs, snakes, and birds, among others. Adults are often taken by sharks. These turtles are solitary, preferring the open ocean. They migrate hundreds or even thousands of miles every year, and come together as a group only once a year for the arribada, when females return to the beaches where they hatched and lumber onshore, sometimes in the thousands, to nest. The olive ridley occurs within the tropical regions of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans. In the Pacific, it nests primarily on beaches from Mexico south to at least Colombia with major nesting beaches at Escobilla, Mexico; La Flor, Nicaragua; and Ostional and Nancite, Costa Rica. In the Indian Ocean, it nests in great abundance in eastern India and Sri Lanka, although minor nesting also occurs at other localities. A small and declining population nests in the western Atlantic, primarily along the coasts of Surinam and French Guiana. It does not nest in the United States, but during feeding migrations, olive ridley turtles nesting in the Pacific may disperse into waters of the southwestern U.S., occasionally as far north as Oregon. The Olive Ridley sea turtle has been an endangered species since 1978.

References! United States Fish and Wildlife Service, North Florida Field Office, 2005. "Olive Ridley sea turtles (Lepidochelys olivacea)". 29 December 2005: 6 June 2007. [|﻿﻿﻿http://www.fws.gov/northflorida/SeaTurtles/Turtle%20Factsheets/olive-ridley-sea-turtle.htm]  Hoekert, W.E.J., Schouten, A.D., van Tienen, L.H.G., and Weijerman, M. 1996. Is the Surinam olive ridley on the eve of extinction? First census data for olive ridleys, green turtles, and leatherbacks since 1989. Marine Turtle Newsletter75: 1-4  Wright, B. and Mohanty, B. 2006. Operation Kachhapa: An NGO initiative for Sea Turtle Conservation in Orissa. In Shanker, K., and Choudhury, B. C. (Eds.). Sea Turtles of the Indian Subcontinent. Hyderabad, India: Universities Press, pp 290-302.