Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL MARINE BIOLOGY AND ECOLOGY
Volume 345, Issue 1, Pages 71-77Publisher
ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV
DOI: 10.1016/j.jembe.2007.02.001
Keywords
Caribbean; precipitation; reptile; sand temperature; sex ratio
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Protracted or intense rainfall may affect the reproductive success of reptilian species on a number of levels ranging from the availability of prey, the integrity of the nesting site and the subsequent survivability of offspring. For sea turtles (a species displaying temperature sex determination) nesting throughout the tropics and subtropics, rainfall has previously been shown to influence the development environment of clutches; in its extreme resulting in high levels of egg or hatchling mortality. Yet when compared to other abiotic variables affecting clutch success, rainfall has received relatively little attention. We therefore examined how fluctuations in local rainfall at a tropical nesting site for leatherback turtles (Dermochelys coriacea) affected the nest environment. Temperature data loggers placed within clutches (n = 8) revealed that protracted rainfall had a marked cooling effect on nests, so that seasonally improbable male-producing temperatures (< 29.75 degrees C) were produced. We use these data to explore how rainfall may ultimately influence the sex ratios of sea turtle hatchlings both within and between nesting seasons, and discuss the importance of robust estimates of rainfall for future demographic models. (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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