Tonight and every night for the next few months the zoologists from the Goldring Marine Biology Research Station will be scanning the beaches of Playa Grande for Eastern Pacific Green Turtles (Chelonia mydas). This is the time of year when female green turtles come ashore to lay their eggs.

The turtle team: Stephen J. Morreale, Jonah Morreale, Sam Friederichs, and Gabriela Blanco.

The research team, led by Gabriela Blanco (Gabi), will locate the female green turtles laying their eggs.

Gabi taking an ultrasound of a female green turtle (photo credit: Sam Friederichs).

Once the female is finished laying her eggs the team will perform an ultrasound to determine whether or not the female has more eggs to lay over the next few weeks (each female can make several trips to the beach to lay eggs over a few week period).

The ultrasound of green turtle eggs in the mama turtle.

If she does not have eggs left to lay, then the team will attach a small cigar-shaped transmitter to the back of her shell. Over the next several months this transmitter will send information about the turtle’s location after it has left Playa Grande. This project will allow the scientists to determine where the Eastern Pacific Green Turtles travel once they have laid their eggs. Gabi’s research has shown that the Eastern Pacific Green Turtles are a genetically distinct population – a population that is under pressure from nesting habitat loss and hunting and is therefore endangered.