A Sea Turtle Picture A Day # 186

Welcome back. Today we are heading up to Vancouver Canada. This picture is of a captive Leatherback that is being raised in captivity so that we may better understand its growth rate. The Leatherback is the most elusive of all the sea turtles. It never stops swimming and knows no boundaries. This is why the researcher has devised this tether so that this turtle will not bump the bottom or the sides of its tank.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D-100 camera with a 70-200 mm lens.

See you tomorrow.

A Sea Turtle Picture A Day # 168

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are heading up to Vancouver Canada. I know this is an unlikely place to see the rarest of all the species of sea turtle.
This picture is of Doctor T Todd Jones who is the only person in the world who has been able to succesfully raise Leatherback Sea Turtles in captivity for over 2 years. Here Dr Jones is measuring the straight carapace length of this captive Leatherback.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D-100 camera with a 70-200 mm lens


See you tomorrow.

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 144

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are heading up to Vancouver Canada. This picture is of the largest Leatherback sea turtle ever raised in captivity.By raising this turtle in captivity the researcher was better able to figure the growth rates of leatherback sea turtles.


This picture was taken with a Nikon D-100 camera with a 60mm lens


See you tomorrow.

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 132

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are up in Vancouver Canada. Why you ask? Well I am helping in a study that is looking how science has effected sea turtles. Specifically how does drag from apparatus that we have applied to sea turtles bodies effect them as they swim.
We are here at a wind tunnel and we are putting these various objects on the turtles and we are figuring where the best place to put them on the turtles that has the least amount of drag on the animal.

These pictures were taken with a Nikon D-90 camera with a 28-200 mm lens

See you tomorrow

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 100

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today is a big day. I am transporting 2 green sea turtles from Vancouver to Guam today.I will post pictures of the trip. This picture is of Ttodd Jones the researcher who has raised these sea turtles since they were a few weeks old. Here is is saying good bye to the 2 that I have loaded up and am driving down to Seattle to load onto an airplane for the trip.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D-90 camera with a 12-24mm lens

See you tomorrow

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 96

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are heading up to Vancouver Canada. I am going to be taking 2 Green sea Turtles from Vancouver to Guam next weekend. A condition of the permit to allow then to travel to Guam is that they are both female. In sea turtles that are this young there is no way to outwardly tell the sex of the animal. But there is a way surgically to tell.
This picture is of Chris Harvey Clark the director of the animal care center at The University Of British Columbia performing a Laparoscopy. This is a surgical procedure where a small incision is made into the turtle and a small tube with a camera is inserted into the turtle. He is then able to locate and verify if the immature turtle has testis(male) or ovary(female).
We had to test 6 of the turtles at the animal care center to find our 2 females.

I am going back up to Vancouver on Thursday with the shipping crates to transport then to Seattle where they will go on a plane for that long trip to Guam.

I am sure that the trip down thru 2 border crossings will be a real treat.I will post pictures and details of this adventure.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D-90 camera with a 12-24 mm lens

See you tomorrow

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 95

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day Today we are heading up to Vancouver Canada. I was up at the lab getting 2 Green Sea turtles ready for a big trip to Guam.
I will be posting the pictures as we make progress with the journey.

This picture is of the turtles as they swim in the holding tank.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D-90 camera with a 28-200 mm lens

See you tomorrow

A Sea Turtle Picture A day # 78

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are heading up to Vancouver British Colombia Canada. Today's picture is of a leatherback Sea Turtles head.

The reason for my choice of this picture is because my niece's are studying salmon in school.And how the salmon navigate. I bet that they didn't know that salmon and sea turtles have the same mineral compound in their brains that allows them to navigate.

The earth has a magnetic field best described as:Lines of magnetic force that flow around the planet from the magnetic south pole to the north pole. Both salmon and sea turtles have a mineral called magnetite in their brains that they use for detection and orientation as the travel in the worlds oceans.

This picture was taken with a Nikon D100 camera with a 60 mm macro lens

A Sea Turtle picture a day # 51

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. I want to welcome our newest follower ACONTECE NEWS to the group. Today we are heading to a very unlikely place to see Sea Turtles. Vancouver Canada. I am a volunteer with the University of British Columbia in the Sea Turtle program. And one of my responsibilities is to take pictures of the turtles. Of all the pictures that I have taken I think that this is my favorite.
The Leatherback sea turtle is the rarest of all the sea turtles.It has a soft shell is in the greatest danger of going extinct.
This particular picture is of a Leatherback sea turtles face and it shows the turtle crying. The turtle is crying salt water tears. The turtle drinks salt water as it is in the ocean. There is a special gland that takes the salt out of the water to allow the turtle to survive. The gland then releases the excessive salt in the form of tears.
This picture was taken with a 60 mm lens
See you tomorrow

A Sea Turtle picture a day #45

Welcome back to A Sea Turtle Picture A Day. Today we are heading north of the border to Vancouver Canada. This picture is of a Leatherback Sea Turtle(Dermochelys coriacea) Which is the rarest of the sea turtles and also the only species that does not have a hard shell. Ttodd Jones is the only researcher in the world that had been able to raise this turtle in captivity for more than 2 years.
In this picture Ttodd is moving this turtle from one tank to another.
In an upcoming issue of National Geographic The May issue. This turtle and more of its species are featured in an article about the Leatherback sea turtle. Unfortunately my picture is not in the magazine.
This picture was taken with a 28-200 mm lens
See you tomorrow