Sea turtles are captivating creatures of the ocean. They’re very well-known for their mass egg hatchings on beaches, so it’s clean to miss something as smooth as their food regimen. Check out this video with the aid of National Geographic of a sea turtle ingesting a jellyfish like spaghetti!
What Do Sea Turtles Eat?
Sea turtle diets range appreciably primarily based on the species. The normal sea turtle that involves mind is the green sea turtle. Green sea turtles eat in most instances algae and seagrasses, which give them every their call and coloration! Hawksbill sea turtles eat solely sea sponges, even as loggerhead sea turtles devour crabs and conchs. Other sea turtle species, at the side of leatherbacks, olive ridleys, Kemp’s ridleys, and flatbacks, all have jellyfish in their diets.
Carnivorous sea turtles opt to get their nutrients from special living organisms, such as crabs and shrimp, for more than one motives. A carnivorous diet affords greater protein and fat to sea turtles, letting them derive greater strength from the components they devour. Leatherbacks’ diets typically include jellyfish, given their particular beaks, which make it tough for them to consume anything else. They have sharp cusps sitting on both the pinnacle and backside jaw that make it easy to pierce smooth organisms which includes jellyfish. This unique beak means that leatherback sea turtles can devour as a whole lot as 16,000 energy in jellyfish a day! Evolving to eat jellyfish has led to precise biology that permits them to resist jellyfish stings.
A absolutely plant-based diet would make it greater difficult for those remarkable creatures to swim. Green sea turtles are an exception to this, in part because of how they’ve developed. These sea turtles have serrated, or noticed-like, beaks that permit them to scrape algae off rocks in massive portions. This is massively distinct from the aforementioned leatherbacks.
How Can Leatherback Sea Turtles Eat Jellyfish?
How may a sea turtle be able to eat jellyfish? Simply positioned, it’s because they’re reptiles. Reptiles’ scales are made from keratin, similar to our nails and hair, and the scales overlap each different all over the body. This creates an exceedingly robust and sturdy layer of pores and skin. This layer makes it tough for jellyfish to sting a sea turtle, as they can’t sting past the strong scales. That’s why in the video, the sea turtle is visible shifting the jellyfish around with its flipper with out worry.
Leatherbacks are particular in that they have got some thing known as papillae. Papillae are small, spiky protrusions which can come off any part or organ of the body. They are frequently seen in animals’ mouths, which includes a cat’s scratchy tongue. Papillae line the mouths and esophagus of leatherback sea turtles, permitting them to correctly consume and digest a jellyfish without being stung. This precise result of evolution has made leatherback sea turtles so exact at ingesting jellyfish, slurping them up like spaghetti!
