OBIS-SEAMAP Dataset - Leatherback Tracking in South Africa

Dataset credit

Islameta Group - Department of Biology, University of Pisa, Italy

Abstract

The Indian Ocean has many breeding areas for sea turtles, the southernmost ones being on the Maputaland coast of KwaZulu-Natal, where leatherback turtles nest in large numbers thanks to long-lasting protection programs. For the leatherback this is the only known nesting site in the entire western Indian Ocean. At the end of the reproductive season, leatherbacks undertake migrations towards disparate feeding areas. To contribute to their conservation, the migratory behavior of these animals has been studied by satellite telemetry for several years. This species turned out to frequent widely dispersed areas ranging from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mozambique Channel, performing large-scale wandering probably due to the leatherbacks' feeding habits on macroplankton such as jellyfish and salps. These movements have been shown to be heavily influenced by the main oceanic currents and oceanographic mesoscale features occurring in the areas crossed.

Purpose

Documenting the extent of the post-nesting movements of leatherbacks nesting in South Africa and understand their behavior.

Supplemental information

N/A

References

Luschi, P., J.R.E. Lutjeharms, P. Lambardi, R. Mencacci, G.R. Hughes, and C.G. Hays. 2006. A review of migratory behaviour of sea turtles off southeastern Africa. South African Journal of Science. 102: 51-58

Luschi, P., A. Sale, R. Mencacci, G.R. Hughes, J.R.E. Lutjeharms, and F. Papi. 2003. Current transport of leatherback sea turtles (Dermochelys coriacea) in the ocean. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 270 suppl. 2: 129-132

Lambardi, P., J.R.E. Lutjeharms, R. Mencacci, C.G. Hays, and P. Luschi,. 2008. Influence of ocean currents on long-distance movement of leatherback sea turtles in the Southwest Indian Ocean. Marine Ecologyl Progress Series. 353: 289-301

Contacts

Role	Name	Organization
Primary contact	Paolo Luschi	University of Pisa
Data entry	Ei Fujioka	Duke University

Attributes

Overview

Attributes described below represent those in the original dataset provided by the provider.
Only minimum required attributes are visible and downlodable online. Other attributes may be obtained upon provider's permission unless otherwise noteded below.

Attributes in dataset provided

Attribute (table column)	Description
datetime	Date and time of observation
latitude	Latitude of observation
longitude	Longitude of observation
sp_obs	Species observed
sp_scientific
sp_tsn	Species ITIS TSN
obs_count	Number of animals observed
series
lc
oid	Unique ID number (generated by SEAMAP)

Leatherback Tracking in South Africa Islameta Group - Department of Biology, University of Pisa