What can we learn from sea turtle strandings?

Abstract

Stranding datasets may provide important information on sea turtle health, age, size composition, diet, reproductive status, population trends and cause-specific mortality. Additionally, they are also used to infer geographic distribution and abundance or even trends in mortality risk, attributable to anthropogenic threats such as coastal fisheries and pollution. Five species of sea turtle were recorded in 5260 strandings from January 2014 to September 2015, along the Brazilian coast, of which 3903 were Chelonia mydas, 914 were Lepidochelys olivacea, 290 were Caretta caretta, 83 were Eretmochelys imbricata, 4 were Dermochelys coriacea and 66 could not be identified.