Chelonia mydas

The green sea turtle, also known as the green turtle, black sea turtle, and Pacific green turtle, is a species of large sea turtle of the family Cheloniidae. It is the only species in the genus Chelonia. Its range extends throughout tropical and subtropical seas around the world, with two distinct populations in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, but it is also found in the Indian Ocean. The common name refers to the usually green fat found beneath its carapace, due to its diet strictly being seagrass, not to the color of its carapace, which is olive to black.

Chelonia mydas

Charles J. Sharp · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
green turtlePBDB
Sits inside
CheloniaPBDB
Diet
omnivorePBDB, for Cryptodira
Life habit
aquaticPBDB, for Cryptodira
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
marinePBDB, for Chelonioidea

Time the record covers

At least 388 thousand years on record.

The record covers at least 400 ka to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 1.75 Mya to 0 Mya.

Pleistocene — about 3 of 6 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 3 of 6 occurrences1.8–1.7 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.7–1.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.6–1.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.6–1.5 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.5–1.4 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.4–1.4 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.4–1.3 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.3–1.2 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.2–1.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.1–1.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences1.1–975 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences975 ka–900 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences900 ka–825 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences825 ka–750 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences750 ka–675 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences675 ka–600 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences600 ka–525 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences525 ka–450 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences450 ka–375 ka Mya — about 0.0 occurrences225 ka–150 ka Mya — about 0.3 occurrences150 ka–75 ka Mya — about 0.8 occurrences75 ka–0 Mya — about 4 occurrences400 ka11.7 ka2.25 Mya0 Mya

6 occurrences of Chelonia mydas on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

6 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

1 formation

Palos Verdes Sand — 33.60°N, 117.80°W

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The named rock units Chelonia mydas has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 5 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Chelonia mydas and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Chelonia mydas and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

291 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Chelonia mydas, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

6 references

Each of the 6 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Chelonia mydas

Credit
Charles J. Sharp
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC0 Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itChelonia through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Linnaeus 1758)