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Laying on the edge: demography of green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas) nesting on Playa Norte, Tortuguero, Costa Rica

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Abstract

The most important nesting site for the green turtle, Chelonia mydas, in the Atlantic basin is Costa Rica’s Tortuguero National Park (TNP). An important portion of this population nests on Playa Norte, an adjacent beach located to the north of TNP. Using 10 years (2006–2015) of mark-recapture data, we estimated demographic parameters for green turtles nesting at Playa Norte. During the 10-year study period, 1573 nesting encounters were recorded, representing 1101 distinct individuals. Open-population models estimated an abundance of 6004 (95% CI 5037–6970), representing the contingent of adult females that nested on Playa Norte at least once during the study period. This estimate includes females that died did not use Playa Norte as nesting site or became post-reproductive after the first nesting encounter as well as nesting and non-nesting adult females in a given year. This open-population abundance estimate and related demographic rates are also assumed to be robust against inter-nesting occurrences between Playa Norte and TNP, and between Playa Norte and other unmonitored and minor beaches. The mean annual survival rate was 0.85 (95% CI 0.76–0.91) and the realized annual population growth from 2006 to 2015 was 1.0179 (95% CI 0.7984–1.2978), indicating a positive trend characterized by an average 1.79% annual increase. The results presented here concur with results from studies of nesting females at TNP and highlight the importance of Playa Norte as a nesting ground for Atlantic green turtles. In addition, our study demonstrated that reliable demographic information can be derived from nesting sites at the edge of a main nesting area if proper survey designs and analytical methods are used.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank to all the volunteers, interns, research coordinators and managers of Caño Palma Biological Station whose effort and dedication made this project possible. Our heartfelt gratitude goes to the Sea Turtle Conservancy for their unwavering support from the start of the project and Costa Rica’s MINAE (Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía) which facilitated the permits. We also thank Joseph Pfaller for his suggestions that noticeably improved the manuscript. This project was funded by COTERC and the Donner Foundation.

Funding

This project was funded by The Canadian Organization for Tropical Education and Rainforest Conservation (COTERC) and the Donner Canadian Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Trent University, 1600 W Bank Dr, Peterborough, ON, K9J 0G2, Canada

    Antonio Velez-Espino

  2. Caño Palma Biological Station, Canadian Organization for Tropical Education and Rainforest Conservation (COTERC), Tortuguero, Limón, Costa Rica

    Helen Pheasey & Luis M. Fernández

  3. Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Pacific Biological Station, 3190 Hammond Bay Rd., Nanaimo, BC, V9T 6N7, Canada

    Andrés Araújo

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  1. Antonio Velez-Espino
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  4. Luis M. Fernández
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Correspondence to Antonio Velez-Espino.

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Velez-Espino, A., Pheasey, H., Araújo, A. et al. Laying on the edge: demography of green sea turtles (Chelonia mydas) nesting on Playa Norte, Tortuguero, Costa Rica. Mar Biol 165, 53 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-018-3305-3

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