Habit:Coastal

The hawksbill’s age at sexual maturity is estimated to be greater than 35 years. Females nest in low densities, with nesting in the U.S. concentrated in Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Florida, and Hawaii. Females lay four to five nests of 130 eggs each during the breeding season, and are believed to breed every two or three years. Nests are often found under vegetation. Adult females are migratory, known to travel hundreds of kilometers between foraging grounds and nesting sites. Hatchlings are oceanic, found in floating vegetation at convergence points. They begin feeding in coastal areas at 20 – 25 cm in length, foraging in coral reefs, rocky outcroppings, or shoals; where these are absent hawksbill turtles may inhabit mangrove fringed bays, estuaries, or in rare circumstances, stone jetties.

Focused diet dominated by

Adults – Invertebrates (sponges)

Hatchlings – Algae

Hawksbill turtles are specialists, their diet being primarily composed of sponges. Tunicates, mollusks, algae, and marine plants are also occasionally found in hawksbill stomachs, but the proportion of these items to sponges is very low. Captive hatchlings have thrived on a diet of Sargassum.

Feeding mode: Grazing

Prey species include:

Adults – Chondrilla nucula, Ancorina sp, Geodia sp., Placospongia sp., Suberites sp., Myriastra sp., Ecionemia sp., Chondrosia sp., Aaptos sp., Tethya cf. actinia,Tethya auranti, Geodia neptuni, Holothuria cubana, Anemonia sulcata, Inachus sp., Rhizophora sp., Cymodocea sp., Eucheuma sp., Codium sp., Coelothrix irregularis, Gracilaria sp., Halimeda incrassata.

Juveniles – Sargassum spp., Syringodium filiforme, Microdictyon sp.

Threats include:

Harvest of adults/eggs

Habitat degradation in nesting sites and coral reefs

Predators at nesting sites

Entanglement in debris/fishing gear

Fisheries bycatch

Oil and plastic pollution

Conservation Status:

The hawksbill sea turtle is classified as critically endangered by the IUCN and is listed as endangered in the U.S. Demand for the beautiful shell has resulted in the harvest of great numbers of this turtle. Demand for shells remains high despite the hawksbill turtle’s decline, as demonstrated by prices in excess of $225 per kilogram. Effective protection is difficult under these circumstances. The relatively late age of sexual maturity (35+ years) prevents the population from quickly recovering from the exploitation of hawksbills as well.

For current information on the conservation status of this species, please visit the following websites.

IUCN Species Redlist

CITES

U.S. FWS Threatened and Endangered Species System (TESS)

Genetic Information Genbank

Museum Collections Smithsonian Institution

National Marine Fisheries Service Office of Protected Species

Lutz, P.L, and J.A. Musick (Eds). 1997. The Biology of Sea Turtles. CRC Press LLC, New York, NY.

National Marine Fisheries Service. 1993. Recovery Plan for the Hawksbill Turtles in the U.S. Caribbean Sea, Atlantic Ocean, and Gulf of Mexico. National Marine Fisheries Service, St. Petersburg, FL.

National Marine Fisheries Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 1998. Recovery Plan for the U.S. Pacific Populations of the Hawksbill Turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata). National Marine Fisheries Service, Silver Spring, MD.