The Importance Of The Sea Turtle

“Crack, crack.” A little fin pops out of its egg on a warm summer day in Florida. Coming out of the egg a small, green, female sea turtle rushes to make it to the ocean without being attacked by predators. Obstacles lie on the beach for the sea turtle to avoid; broken glass, fishing lines, nets, garbage from the last visitor of the day before. The sea turtle gets entrapped in the fishing line, unable to make it to the ocean, and ultimately devoured by the seagulls. Recently, this has been the pattern for sea turtles; however, there was a time when this wasn’t the case: “[Sea turtles] have existed for over 100 million years” (Sea Turtle Conservancy, “Why Care?”) without the trouble of pollution on beaches and oceans. Sea turtles are important to the environment—they act as a keystone species, providing other sea life with safe homes away from predators by consuming their primary food source. A sea turtle’s main component of food consists of seagrass which needs to be maintained and kept short because “they provide breeding and developmental grounds for many species of fish, shellfish and crustaceans. Without seagrass beds, many marine species humans harvest would be lost, as would lower levels of the food chain” (Sea Turtle Conservancy,

The Hospital “has successfully treated and released over 1500 Sea Turtles since its founding in 1986” (Turtle Hospital). The Sea Turtle Hospital rescues wounded sea turtles out in the ocean or on beaches and then brings them to their facility to operate on them. The sea turtle will go to rehab at the facility until able to be released. If a sea turtle is unable to be released it will live on the grounds of the headquarters—spending the rest of it’s days with other sea turtles who are not capable of living on their own. The majority of wounded sea turtles are being saved due to The turtle