Reproductive biology of green turtle at Ko Khram Island, Chonburi Province, Thailand

Abstract

Survey on green sea turtle nesting at Ko Khram Island, Chonburi Province was undertaken by using electronic microchip tag during the nesting season of 1994-2000. Some green turtles returned ashore to nest on the same beach up to 5 times with inter-nesting interval of mostly 10-12 days. Nesting cycle in between breeding season shows a remigration of 2-5 years periodicity. The nesting females average 97.6 cm in curved carapace length and grow slowly at a mean rate of 0.36 cm per year. No trend of growth increasing in yearly mean carapace length for green turtles nesting during 1986-2000 was examined. The results seem that the nesting female population may have the recruitment for each year, otherwise the trend of size average in many years should be increase into a consistency of growth. However, the number of egg collection in last over 10 years at Ko Khram Island showed a little decline. More information of tag return, including the turtle recapture from feeding ground, are entirely needed in order to determine and estimate the population of sea turtle in the future.