Why is the focus on protecting turtles in Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico waters?
A2: Florida’s beaches (bordering both the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico) support the largest nesting aggregations of loggerhead, leatherback, green and hawksbill turtles in the southeast U.S. Florida’s waters also provide important feeding habitats for large numbers of juvenile and adult sea turtles. Small sea turtles such as the olive ridley and Kemp’s ridley nest along the Mexican Gulf of Mexico coastline and live in Gulf of Mexico waters. Only about 1 in 1,000 sea turtles survive to maturity. More than 90 percent of turtle hatchlings are eaten by predators. To learn more about protecting sea turtles, visit http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/prot_res/PR3/turtles/turtles.html.
