According to the Center for Biological Diversity, there may only be around 50,000 loggerhead turtles left in the wild. But now experts say they may have a lifeline in the Mediterranean and global warming might actually be helping them along. Veuer’s Tony Spitz has the details.
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00:00These are loggerhead sea turtles, and for years their numbers have been in decline.
00:04In fact, according to the Center for Biological Diversity,
00:07there may be only around 50,000 of them left in the wild.
00:10But now experts say they may have a lifeline in the Mediterranean,
00:14and global warming might actually be helping them along.
00:16A recent report by Global Ecology and Conservation
00:19found some 84 nests on beaches in France, Italy, Spain, and Tunisia in 2020.
00:24That's compared to an average of less than three a year in the decade prior.
00:27The researchers say this is likely due to new colonizations of turtles
00:31due to warming waters in the Mediterranean,
00:33with one of the researchers saying about the loggerhead numbers,
00:36quote,
00:36Areas where turtles never used to reach because they were not adequate for laying eggs
00:40are getting warmer, and perhaps now that these areas are warmer, they are now adequate.
00:44According to Spain-based environmental organization CEAM,
00:48the Mediterranean has gotten 2.3 degrees Fahrenheit warmer since 1982.
00:52Loggerheads are the world's largest hard-shelled turtle species,
00:55and they can live up to 100 years, which the researchers say because of this,
00:59it takes years to get adequate information on their populations.