Remote submerged banks and mesophotic ecosystems can provide key habitat for endangered marine megafauna.

ABSTRACT: The importance of some ecosystems remains poorly understood. We showed that mesophotic ecosystems (30 to 150 m) are a key habitat for a critically endangered species, with strong evidence that a globally important population of adult hawksbill turtles (Eretmochelys imbricata) almost exclusively foraged at these depths on remote submerged banks. This discovery highlights the need for such areas to be included in conservation planning, for example, as part of the United Nations High Seas Treaty. We equipped nesting turtles with Fastloc-GPS (Global Positioning System) satellite tags at an Indian Ocean breeding area and they all traveled to deep foraging sites (6765 days of tracking data across 22 individuals including 183,921 dive-depth measurements) rather than shallow coral reef site

SUBMITTER: Hays GC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10881038 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature