Category Archives: Book

Title: The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
Author(s): Richard Dawkins
Release year: 1986
Publisher: Norton & Company, Inc

Why in Database: The turtles in this book are mentioned only once, in the context of reptiles.

‘Reptiles’ is not a true taxonomic term, according to cladists, because it is defined by exception: all amniotes except birds and mammals. In other words, the most recent common ancestor of all ‘reptiles’ (snakes, turtles, etc.) is also ancestral to some non-‘reptiles’, namely birds and mammals.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Blue Planet. A natural History of the Oceans
Author(s): Andrew Byatt, Alastair Fothergill, Martha Holmes
<Release year: 2001
Publisher: BBC Books

Why in Database: This book is a kind of supplement, complementary material to the TV nature series Blue Planet. There are many fragments about turtles, one huge (~3 pages), one smaller (one “frame”) and a lot of tiny mentions. We cite all such pieces.

The first mention is about laying eggs and coordinating of that with the tides:

Olive ridley turtles also seem to coordinate their egg-laying with the tidal cycle. On just a few nights each year, tens of thousands of females emerge together on just a few beaches worldwide in a breeding spectacle called an arribada. These arribadas always start when the moon is in first or last qurter. This is the time of neap tides, when the sea tends to be calmer and more of the beach remains exposed, making egg-laying easier.

The second mention is about Ghost Crabs, that sometimes eat baby turtles:

they will eat practically anything, and will even grab unfortunate turtle hatchlings down indo their burrows.

The next piece deals with how black vultures benefit from access to turtle eggs:

In Costa Rica the mass nesting of thousands of Olive Ridley turtles supports hundreds of black vultures which patrol the beach each morning. As the rising tide washes turtle eggs out of the sand, the vultures snap them up.

Another mention is a brief note that sea turtles must lay their eggs on the mainland:

The ancestors of today’s sea turtles were originally land-based reptiles, and as they still lay eggs with shells, they have no option but to deposit them on dry land.

The following excerpt is the longest fragments in the book about turtles, extending over three pages and introducing many facts about them:

REPTILES RETURN
The tiny island of Ascension, which lies in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, is just it km (7 miles) wide. While most of it is an inhospitable volcanic wasteland, it has a few sandy beaches that provide the only nesting sites for thousands of green turtles. These creatures, who spend most of their lives in a solitary pursuit of food along the coast of Brazil, make an annual 2400 km (1500 mile) migration out into the Atlantic Ocean. Exactly how they navigate their way to the tiny pinprick of rock that is Ascension still remains something of a mystery. However, year after year the females return to exactly the same rookery at which they themselves were hatched.
A safe place for the eggs
Sea turtles produce the soft, leathery eggs typical of most reptiles. As they evolved on land, they are not able to withstand the rigours of salt water, so they must be laid on land where the warmth of the sand incubates them. The traditional nesting beaches are known as rookeries, but why particular beaches are favoured is far from clear. It may be that current nesting choices reflect historic patterns that have existed for hundreds or thousands of years. Many suitable beaches may now be untouched simply because the local turtle population has been over-exploited or disturbed by man. Certainly tagging experiments and DNA analysis have shown that females not only return to the same beach every year, but, typically emerge within a few hundred metres of where they last nested. A perfect nesting beach for sea turtles needs to have open-water access, it must be free from the risks of flooding by tide or ground water and the sand must be just the right consistency for egg-laying. Too soft and it is almost impossible for the female to dig a nesting burrow without it collapsing. Too solid and there is not enough air for the incubating eggs. Gathering off the rookeries to mate after weeks or even months of migration, the females are sexually receptive for just one week. During this time they may be inseminated by several males, who are sexually active for about a month. At the end of this courtship period, the males return home, but the females will remain for months. Using stored sperm, they fertilize the eggs inside their body, then wait offshore for about two weeks until they are ready to lay. They then haul themselves on to the beach. Within minutes of leaving their natural habit, the turtles are exhausted by the struggles of returning to land. Their eyes clog with sand and every metre up the beach seems an effort. The final challenge is digging a hole in the sand and laying about 120 eggs within it. Just two weeks later, the ordeal must be repeated to lay another clutch of eggs. This process continues throughout the breeding season, with some turtles laying up to 11 clutches.
During the long months at the rookeries,th females spend little time feeding, living instead off their reserves of fat stored up before the migration began. They are unlikely to return the following year. It will be between two and eight years before this particular set of females undertake the breeding migration again.
The hatchlings emerge
Incubation of the eggs normally takes about eight weeks, but the temperature of the sand determines the speed with which the embryos develop. As turtles have no sex-determining chromosomes, temperature also determines the sex of the hatchlings. Below 28 °C (82°F) and almost all the hatchlings will be male. Above 30.5 °C (87 °F) and nearly all the hatch-lings will be female.
Once they emerge from the eggs, the baby turtles face a real challenge in getting to the sea. In a blindly co-operative effort, the siblings get to the surface of the nest with a sporadic series of thrashings. This may take several days, and they usually emerge at night or during a rainstorm, as hot daytime sand could be lethal. Watching a clutch of turtles hatching is always a touching moment. The surface of the sands begins to twitch. A little black head appears, then a flipper, another head, and soon a gaggle of tiny clockwork toy-like hatchlings emerges.
With no adults to guide them, the newborns rely on instinct to find the sea. Strongly attracted to light, they scurry towards the dim glow reflected off the ocean’s surface. As soon as they reach the surf, the tiny turtles instinctively dive down to the bottom, riding the undertow out to calm water beyond the breakers. Then, for 24 hours or more, the hatchlings swim frenziedly to reach deeper water. Those that survive will drift the ocean currents for several years before eventually finding their way to the traditional feeding grounds on the continental shelf.
Meal in a shell
A number of different predators have learnt that breeding turtles provide an easy source of food. Crab Island, off the tip of Australia’s remote Cape York Peninsula, seems like a perfect nesting place for the rare flat-backed turtle: it is isolated and free of human disturbance — but it is also the home of massive saltwater crocodiles. These creatures, which can measure 7-8 m (23-26 feet) long, are gruesome foes, but even they find it difficult to crack open the shell of a metre-long turtle. For up to 3o minutes the crocodile thrashes the turtle in the surf. Eventually the carapace shatters and all that is left on the beach the following morning are a few scraps of shell and traces of blood.
Despite this hazard, most of the females make it safely up the beach to lay their eggs, but eight weeks later their hatchlings emerge to a different threat. Hundreds of night herons will suddenly appear and catch most of the hatch-lings as they dash for the sea. Pelicans also join in, filling their beaks with sand in their haste to steal the hatchlings before the herons. The few newborns that do make it to the water must then get past the crocodiles, sharks and fish waiting in the shallows. Given this gauntlet of predators it is hardly surprising that probably fewer than one in a thousand hatchlings survive to adulthood.
Pressure from predators may be the reason why many turtles choose to breed on islands. Although birds may pose a problem, there are likely to be fewer ground-based predators. The Olive Ridley, however, is one turtle that often nests on mainland shores. There they face a range of extra predators including ants, vultures, ghost crabs, coatis, racoons and feral pigs, but their response has been to develop a different nesting strategy,. Having discovered safety in numbers, the females return to breed in their tens of thousands for just a few nights each year. This synchronized mass nesting is called an arribada and probably plays a signifi-cant part in diluting the effect of predators.

Another mention is tiny, states that sea birds, like turtles, need solid land to reproduce:

Just like sea turtles, the world’s sea birds have no option but to return to land to breed.

Another mention is less direct, because it is about a species of seagrass that has a reference to turtles in its name (testudinum), it is eaten by turtles and often called turtle grass:

Despite this, in the afternoon, when photosynthesis and therefore oxygen production is at its peak, the leaves of Thalassia testudinum swell up 250 per cent and become oval in shape because they cannot get rid of the oxygen quickly enough.

Another mention is the mention of turtles, that among other animals, they benefit from the fact that some plants grow quickly:

Seagrass meadows also grow quickly, some plants extending by as much as 5-10 mm (0,2-0,4 in) per shoot per day, so they are a valuable source of food for herbivores, such as sea urchins, fishes, turtles and dugongs.

The next fragment is about leatherback turtles:

Leatherback turtles are cold-blooded reptiles which breathe air, yet still dive to depths in excess of 1300 m (4265 feet). Weighing up to 1000 kg (2200 lb), these giant creatures are superbly adapted navigators and divers, with a preferred diet of jellyfish. They migrate thousands of kilometres to reach their temperate feeding grounds, where immense concentrations of plankton are found in the deep scattering layer (> p. 328). During the night, this layer is at depths of as little as 100 m (330 feet), but by day it migrates to over 500 m (1640 feet) down.The turtles follow with ease, their bodies being coated in smooth skin to improve their hydrodynamic performance. Unlike other sea turtles, leatherbacks have a flexible shell made of ribs set in a thick, oily cartilage and covered with a pattern of bony plates. This helps them to cope with the pressures of deep diving. Most staggering of all is the speed of their dives: in as little as 10 minutes they can plummet vertically downwards for 500 m (1640 feet), feed and return to the surface, repeating the performance five times each hour.

The next piece is a caption of the photo next to the above fragment:

The massive leatherback turtle persues plankton far down in the deep scattering layer, but perhaps the most bizzare planktivore of all is the giant sunfish.

Another fragment is about bended pilot fish that like to swim with sharks and turtles:

The bended pilot fish does this, travelling in the slipstream of creatures such as sharks and turtles.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Oceans: Exploring the Hidden Depths of the Underwater World
Author(s): Paul Rose, Anne Laking
Release year: 2009
Publisher: BBC Books

Why in Database: Book accompanying the TV nature series, Oceans. There are several turtle mentions in it, including two photographs.

The first reference is about the negative effects of man-made marine pollution:

The effect has been devastating with many species now threatened with extinction. That includes the monk seal, the loggerhead turtle and even a species of seagrass.

Second fragment is the description of the photo:

The loggerhead turtle (right) and the monk seal (opposite) are two species also at risk from pollution.

Another mention is rather sad, about the “by catch” phenomenon, catching in the net other animals than the ones you want – with a tragic effect for them:

Dolphin and sandbar sharks are now under threat while turtles are frequently damaged or killed.

Next is about the California coast:

Five ow world’s seven species of sea turtle migrate here: leatherback, loggerhead, hawksbill, olive ridley and the Pacific green turtle – also known, rather confusingly, as the ‘black turtle”.

Another is a piece of text directly above the Leatherback Turtle’s photo, information how important they are to the Seri people and how much endangered:

The Seri regard the leatherback turtle as a sacred embodiment of their ancestors. Traditionally, if one was inadvertenly captured they held a four-day ceremony to protect it, building a shelter, painting powerfull motifs on its back, and singing and dancing. One ceremony took place in 2005, but no others had occured for about 20 years, because leatherback turtles are now rarely found in the northern Sea of Cortez – they are one of the world’s most endangered marine turtles.

The next one, next to the above text, is the description of the photo:

The leatherback turtle, regarded by the Sari as a sacred embodiment of their ancetors, is one of the world’s most endangered species of marine turtle.

The last one is a record of the feelings of a diver visiting a coral reef that is full of life:

The Reef was animated – soft corals swaying to the current and ocean’s surce, clown fish darting in and out of thei save anemone haven, beatiful but poisonous lionfish drifting pasat me in the current, the sounds of parrotfish crunching at the hard corals, schools of brigtly coloured jacks flying past, the silhouettes of turtles above me, all contributing to that wonderful feeling of line on a healthy tropical reef.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Planet Earth: As You’ve Never Seen It Before
Author(s): Alastair Fothergill, Vanessa Berlowitz, Mark Brownlow, Huw Cordey, Jonathan Keeling
Release year: 2006
Publisher: BBC Books

Why in Database: A complementary book to the tv nature series with the same title . There are only few turtle fragments, actually only minor references plus one (full-page) graphic.

The first mentionis about, the Amazon River:

Other oversized predators include the world’s largest freshwater dolphin, otter and river turtle and the green anaconda, which can grow to more than 6m (20 feet) long.

Second fragments is about Jaguars diet:

(…) capable of klling large mammals, but its normal prey animals are small – anything from turtles to peccaries (small pigs).

Another mention is about “underwater meadows”:

A whole community of detritus feeders and herbivores depend on the seagrass for their food – sea urchins, turtles and een some parrotfish graze the beds, and many tiny creatures live on and arround their leaves.

The next fragment is a description of the photography:

A baby green turtle sheltering in sargassum weed.

Fragment about Nekton, “things” that can move by itself in water and are not dependent on the current:

(…) and they include most of the fish, squid, marine mammals (dolphins, whales, seals and so on), turtles, seas snakes and even penguins.

The last fragment is about diving:

For instance, the only deep-diving turtle is the leatherback. Most marine turtles have rigid shells, but the leatherback has a flexible shell that allows it to survive the changing pressure. Even so, leatherbacks only make quick foraging trips down to 500m (1640 feet) and back in just 10 minutes.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Charles Darwin
Author(s): Anna Sproule
Release year: 1990
Publisher: Exley

Why in Database: Book about Charles Darwin must have some turtle elements. In this one we can some (we quote all below), there are also two photos of turtles. The book was published in English, but we do not have access to such a version, so for now we present the quotes in Polish and describe their content.

The first case is an extensive description above the photo, a mention that it was the turtles that led Darwin to the path leading to his famous theory:

(…) ogromny żółw (poniżej) kroczy przez zarośla. 150 lat temu ich przodkowie skierowali Karola Darwina na ścieżkę prowadzącą do odkrycia, które całkowicie zmieniło sposób myślenia świata.

The second fragment is about fact, that Darwin saw turtles on the Galapagos:

Obok, żując kaktus kroczyły ogromne żółwie.

Another mention is about the stay of the ship at the Galapagos Islands and replenishing supplies there – with meat of turtles, from which the islands took their name:

Było to mięso zwierząt, od których pochodziła hiszpańska nazwa wysp: galapagos, czyli olbrzymich żółwi, przechadzających się w zaroślach na wyspie.

Two more mentions are in the form of quotes directly from Charles Darwin’s books:

“Bawiło mnie zawsze bardzo, gdy, prześcigając którego z tych wielkich potworów, widziałem, jak gwałtownie, w momencie, gdy go mijałem, wciągał głowę i nogi i wydając głęboki syk, opadał na ziemię jak zabity. Często siadałem na ich grzbiecie i gdy postukałem wtedy w tylną część pancerza, wstawały i maszerowały – ale przekonałem się, że bardzo było trudno utrzymać równowagę”.
Karol Darwin o żółwiach na Galapagos “Podróż na okręcie <>”

:Podziw mój budzi jednak ta okoliczność, że poszczególne wyspy mają swój własny gatunek żółwia, drozda przedrzeźniacza, łuszczaków i licznych roślin, przy tym gatunki te mają na ogół te same zwyczaje… i oczywiście zajmują to samo miejsce w ekonomii natury na tym archipelagu”.
Karol Darwin o swych odkryciach na Galapagos “Podróż na okręcie <>”

The next one is more than a page entirely devoted to turtles, their diversity and the meaning of it:

Różne wyspy, różne żółwie
“Żółwie także były tajemniczymi istotami. Pierwsza zagadka, która stanęła przed Darwinem, była łatwa do rozwiązania. Początkowo nie wiedział, kto na tych odludnych wyspach wytyczył wyraźne ścieżki, prowadzące od wybrzeża do wzgórz w głębi wysp.
Wkrótce jednak odkrył, że były to tropy żółwi. Żółwie od pokoleń wydeptywały szerokie drogi, wędrując do swoich stałych wodopojów, źródeł w środku wyspy. Dzięki nim właśnie pierwsi przybysze odkryli na Galapagos wodę.
Zgłębienie drugiej tajemnicy było dla Darwina — i dla wielu innych — dużo trudniejsze. Naprowadził go na nią wicegubernator Galapagos, Anglik imieniem Nicholas Lawson. Żółwie, jak wiedział Darwin, żyły na większości wysp. Pewnego dnia Lawson przy jakiejś okazji nadmienił, że na pierwszy rzut oka potrafi rozróżnić, z której wyspy pochodzi schwytany żółw. Inni wyspiarze także to potrafili. Żółwie z różnych wysp miały różne płytki, różne kształty, a nawet inny smak. Żółwie z Wyspy Jakuba, środkowej, słynęły z tego, że były bardzo smaczne.
Czym można to wyjaśnić?
Początkowo Darwin nie zwracał uwagi na te miejscowe informacje. Dopiero potem uświadomił sobie ich znaczenie. Był to wstrząs dla niego, bardzo nieprzyjemna chwila. Zgromadził już bowiem okazy z dwóch wysp Galapagos, ale, niestety, pomieszał oba zbiory.
Mimo to wiedział, że wyspiarze mają rację. I wiedział także, że jest na tropie czegoś bardzo zastanawiającego. Wyspy były bardzo podobne, miały taki sam klimat. Większość z nich znajdowała się blisko siebie: w zasięgu wzroku. A jednak każda, jak się wydawało, miała własną, odrębną populację zwierząt.
Kilka wysp, był tego pewny, miało własną, specjalną odmianę żółwi. Czy miały także własną, specjalną odmianę łuszczaków? Trudno powiedzieć. Darwin znowu klął, że pomieszał okazy. Wydawało się to jednak prawdopodobne. Były także na wyspach drozdy przedrzeźniacze. Również między nimi występowały dziwne różnice.
Jak doszło do tych różnic? Dlaczego do nich doszło? Czy rzeczywiście wszystkie żółwie i drozdy zostały stworzone przez Boga, każda odmiana dla innej małej wyspy?

The next fragment is again, a mention in the caption above the photo (showing preserved birds):

Konkluzje… i świadectwa. Każdy ptak umieszczony jest obok wyspy, z której pochodzi. Przez wiele lat sądzono, że ideę ewolucji nasunęły Darwinowi łuszczaki z Galapagos i ich rozmaite dzioby. W rzeczywistości na wyspach uwagę jego przykuły najpierw drozdy i żółwie. Dopiero po powrocie do Anglii stwierdził, że wśród jego starannie zgromadzonych zbiorów naukowych znajduje się trzynaście różnych gatunków. łuszczaków.

Caption next to two photos, one with a turtle:

Iguana lądowa i żółw olbrzymi z Galapagos.

The next fragment is again, about what made Darwin think about his theory:

Tak więc trzy gatunki drozda, trzynaście gatunków łuszczaka… a do tego jeszcze żółwie.

The last fragment says why the islands, although close, are diverse in terms of fauna and flora (due to sea currents):

Te zachodnie prądy odcinały wyspy południowe od północnych, podczas gdy Wyspy Jakuba, źródło najlepszego mięsa żółwiowego, była odcięta dwukrotnie. Między nią a większą wyspą Aldamerle płynął bowiem w kierunku północnym jeszcze jeden prąd.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Horrible Geography – Wild Islands
Author(s): Anita Ganeri, Mike Philips (ilustrator)
Release year: 2004
Publisher: Scholastic

Why in Database: There are some turtle mentions in this book – mostly related to the Galapagos and local turtles.

The first mention is in the text in the speech bubble of one of the characters, the guide to the islands:

Depending on which island you choose to live on, you’re more likely to meet tortoises the size of cars and larger-than-life lizards with bad breath.

The next two fragments come from the page where there is also a large, two-page drawing of turtles – we also attach it below, in the section with covers:

1. Giant Tortoise
Habitat: Galapagos Islands.
Appearance: Er, like a giant, and i mean GIANT tortoise. It can grow 1,5m long and weight a quarter of a tonne. Imagine having one of these outsized reptiles rummaging around athe the bottom of your garden!

These whoopers were once so common, visitors claimed they could use them as giant stepping-stones and walk long distances across their backs. Without touching the ground once! But early sailors killed so many for their meat, they almost wiped them out. Get this. the sailors bundled them into the ships’ holds, STILL ALIVE and turned upside down on their backs, for weeks on end. they said it kept the meat nice and fresh, like sort of a tortoise takeaway. Horribry cruel, i know. Especially as these giants can live to the ripe old age of 200 in the wild. What’s that, sir? No, we don’t allow visitors to feed them. They normally eat almost any kind of fruit or veg but the’re not really fussy These beauties would eat you out of house and home, gien half a chance. Including your tent and clothes.

Another mention comes from the stylized as authentic record of Charles Darwin’s memoirs, next to it there is also a drawing of him on a turtle (we attach it of course, in section with covers):

I even got to ride on a giant tortoise, though it was a bit wabbly and I almost fell off.

Another fragment is about Darwin and his discovery/formulation of the Theory of Evolution:

It was the same with the tortoises. Their diffrent-shaped shells allowed them to reach plants high up or low down.

The next mention is in the description of the Galapagos, a curiosity about the name:

The name Galapagos comes from a Spanish word for tortoise. So you could say giant reptiles put these farout islands on the map.

The last mention takes place in a loose summary of what the reader could read/see so far:

So you’ve gawped at truck-sized tortoises, had a big, sloppy kiss from a dragon, and ogled at amazing aye-ayes.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Horrible Geography – Odious Oceans
Author(s): Anita Ganeri, Mike Philips (ilustrator)
Release year: 1999
Publisher: Scholastic

Why in Database: The turtle element appears in this book in a single reference, when mankind’s various bad practices are described. In the passage about throwing things out into the oceans, turtles (and other animals) and their sad fate are mentioned.

What’s so sick about that?: Thousands of sea birds, mammals, turtles and fish get caught up in old ropes and nets and tie as they try to escapes.

Author: XYuriTT