Age and age estimation in sea turtles

Abstract

While the specific life histories of different species and populations vary to some extent, sea turtles typically are long-lived, slow-growing, and wide-ranging, occupying multiple habitats over the course of their development (Musick and Limpus, 1997; Heppell et al., 2002). Each of these habitats is likely to present varying threats that will impact survival probabilities (Lewison et al., 2004; Moore et al., 2009; Bolten et al., 2011). Knowledge of how long each developmental area is occupied is therefore critical to understanding how habitat-specific survival rates may influence the proportion of the population that survives to reach Age at Sexual Maturation (ASM).