Related topics: eggs · sea turtles

Characterizing salps as predators of marine microbes

A huge fraction of global flows of carbon and other nutrients pass through marine microbes. Little is known about their causes of death, however. This information determines where those nutrients will go.

Lights on fishing nets can protect sea turtles

Lights on fishing nets could help save the Mediterranean's threatened sea turtles, new research shows. The work is published in the journal Fisheries Research.

How to dim the consequences of global light pollution

Our ancestors could look up and see the Milky Way—our galaxy—as a large band of white light stretching across the sky. Because of light pollution, that's no longer the case. One study estimated that 60% of Europeans and ...

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Turtle

Cryptodira Pleurodira and see text

Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines (the crown group of the superorder Chelonia), characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield. "Turtle" may either refer to the Testudines as a whole, or to particular Testudines which make up a form taxon that is not monophyletic—see also sea turtle, terrapin, tortoise, and the discussion below.

The order Testudines includes both extant (living) and extinct species. The earliest known turtles date from 215 million years ago, making turtles one of the oldest reptile groups and a more ancient group than lizards and snakes. About 300 species are alive today, and some are highly endangered.

Like other reptiles, turtles are ectotherms—varying their internal temperature according to the ambient environment, commonly called cold-blooded. Like other amniotes (reptiles, dinosaurs, birds, and mammals), they breathe air and do not lay eggs underwater, although many species live in or around water. The largest turtles are aquatic.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA