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Home range of immature green turtles tracked at an offshore tropical reef using automated passive acoustic technology

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Abstract

Seventeen immature green turtles Chelonia mydas were tracked concurrently by automated ultrasonic receivers at a coral reef off North-Eastern Australia (September–December 2010, 16.4°S, 145.6°E). The majority (n = 11) were tracked for the entire 100-day study, the remainder for 23–85 days. Detection data aggregated at 30-min intervals produced median 6.5–35 daily locations for individual turtles. Home range areas (95 % utilisation distribution) were ≤1 km2, \( {\bar{\text{x}}} \) ± SD = 0.74 km2 ± 0.159. To the best of our knowledge, these are the first home range estimates for C. mydas foraging at offshore tropical reefs. The findings are important for conservation in revealing near-continuous presence of the same individuals within a small geographic area. Time between detections was very short (median <3 min) demonstrating passive ultrasonic technology can track multiple turtles in a foraging environment with higher temporal resolution than typically achieved by satellite tracking.

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Acknowledgments

Equipment and logistical support were provided by private donors, James Cook University, Queensland Parks and Wildlife and Quicksilver Connections. Grateful thanks to Ian Bell, Col Limpus, Colin Simpfendorfer and Michelle Heupel for expert advice, to Sam Dibella and volunteers for fieldwork assistance, to Clement Calenge and colleagues for adehabitatHR and to peer reviewers for helpful suggestions. Field research was conducted under the authority of James Cook University Ethics Approval A1474 and scientific research permits G10/33206.1, G10/33897.1 and WISP06563509.

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Correspondence to Julia Hazel.

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Communicated by J. D. R. Houghton.

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Hazel, J., Hamann, M. & Lawler, I.R. Home range of immature green turtles tracked at an offshore tropical reef using automated passive acoustic technology. Mar Biol 160, 617–627 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-012-2117-0

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