On The Verge Of Extinction, The Critically Endangered Leatherback Sea Turtle May Be The Most Amazing Animal On Earth
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Probably, you—and most of your friends– have never heard of . . . the leatherback sea turtle. And, though you may not have known it exists, the leatherback probably is the most amazing animal on earth. Sounds nuts, but that is my story and I’m sticking to it. Here is the “rest of the story” to quote Paul Harvey. It begins some hundred ten million years ago. At some unknown time before then, its ancestors walked on dry land with four legs and feet. Over time, however, legs and feet evolved into powerful flippers and it moved into the Seven Seas. Actually, this was so long ago that the Seven Seas did not yet exist.
The world was a very different place way back then. The Himalayas of Tibet did not exist that long ago. Indeed, the Himalayas were still 65,000,000 years away from even existing. Antarctica was connected to Australia when the first leatherbacks took to the sea and would not uncouple from it for about thirty million more generations of these sea animals. South America remained near West Antarctica. Another eighty million years would pass before Antarctica would turn into the frigid continent we see. The South Atlantic Ocean was still forming. Indeed, not only were there no Seven Seas way back then, there were not seven continents, either.
When the forebears of today’s leatherbacks evolved into sea dwellers, there were no birds in the sky, no lions, tigers, or buffaloes because there were no mammals at all on earth. The awesome Tyrannosaurus Rex would not terrorize the planet for about four hundred thousand centuries more. Yes, that is right: 400,000 centuries.
Perhaps you know that porpoises and the mighty whales were animals that once lived on land and moved to the water. But, porpoises and whales are mammals (whose closest relative is the hippopotamus) that did not exist until millions of years after the last dinosaur passed away. Sea turtles had already been swimming in the sea for fifty million years before these mighty mammalian leviathans first left land for the water.
Of the six sea turtle species still in existence, these are by far the Mothers of All Turtles. They sometimes weigh nearly a ton. A few years ago one caught in Wales tipped the scales at 1,980 pounds. And, despite its impressive size, this ocean traveling reptile lived through the terrible and extraordinary catastrophic extinction that killed nearly every animal on earth. One of the oldest and most resilient animals on the face of the globe, it is clearly qualified for the “most amazing animal” award but there is more to this animal—much more.
Consider its athletecism. As a swimmer, how does it stack up against, say, Michael Phelps. Phelps is the fastest swimmer in the world and set a world record freestyle win in the 2008 Olympics. But, suppose he had to swim that race against a leatherback. No question Phelps would be sleeker and trimmer and the turtle would have to drag through the water about 1,800 more pounds (sort of like a handicap for a race horse). Now, imagine that the spectacular Phelps swam the race of his life and set another world record at 200 meters. And where would the turtle be? Oh, yea. It would be off in the distance some 800 meters ahead, having left Michael in its wake. This turtle can swim 1,000 meters in the same time Phelps swims just 200. The extraordinary shelled athlete is in the 1992 Guinness Book of World Records as the fastest reptile on earth! And, incredibly, a leatherback swims at nearly the same speed as the world’s fastest man can run—in the short 100 yard dash! Impressed yet?
This marine speed demon is also a marathon swimmer of epic proportions and may migrate farther than any other creature alive today. One of these turtles was tracked by scientists migrating 13,000 miles.
Are you getting convinced this is the most amazing animal yet? Hold on, there is more. In addition to being the world’s fastest reptile and maybe the world’s greatest long-distance migrator, it routinely does something the human race cannot achieve, even with its fancy technology. It can dive nearly 4,000 feet underwater. At that depth pressure approaches two thousand pounds per square inch. How much pressure is that? Well, it has been estimated that today’s best nuclear attack submarines would be completely crushed at a depth of less than 2,500 feet. Even Man’s best technology and strongest metal and composite materials are no match for the diving ability of a one hundred million year old race of creatures we consider primitive.
There is also the incredible fact that are found in all tropical and subtropical waters on earth and have been seen as far north as the Arctic Circle, in Alaska, not far from Quebec, and even Norway, and as far south as the Cape of Good Hope and below New Zealand, in waters as cold as 40 degrees fahrenheit. Yet, although they are cold blooded reptiles, they remain toasty warm because they can maintain a body temperature as much as 32 degrees higher than the surrounding water.
Disastrously, in literally the last 30 years, this magnificent animal has been decimated in numbers and is now classified as critically endangered. In 1980, Mexico had two-thirds leatherbacks on earth. Within 25 years, its leatherback population had collapsed 99%, a catastrophe by any measure. In far off Malaysia, on beaches that once had 10,000 leatherback nests a year, there were two nestings in 2008. Never underestimate the power of human stupidity, rapaciousness, and destructiveness. The Angels are surely weeping.
This reptile was witness to the separation of the continents and birth of the modern oceans, lived through the Age of Dinosaurs, survived the mass extinction caused by a meteorite. It swims faster, farther, deeper than almost anything on the planet and has been in our oceans for more than a hundred million years . Can it survive us?
Tiny Costa Rica is trying to do its part in conserving this irreplaceable species and has set aside reserves on both the Pacific and Caribbean coasts. Tortuguero is the world’s largest green sea turtle preserve and Ostional Refuge has one of the world’s biggest olive ridley sea turtle nestings. Costa Rica ecotourism is playing an important role in conserving sea turtles. And, if you take a Costa Rica vacation, be sure to look for the rare but awesome leatherback.
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