Threatened North African seagrass meadows have supported green turtle populations for millennia

Abstract

The persistence of most species and their key habitats is intimately tied together. Sea turtles famously exhibit a strong fidelity to their natal rookery where they return to nest. While satellite tracking has provided evidence of foraging-ground fidelity, this approach is limited to a small number of turtles observed over a few years. Incorporating the bioarchaeological record, we found that Mediterranean green turtles have been utilizing the same North African seagrass meadows for at least ~3,000 y. This enables site fidelity to be established at the generational level, uncovering habitat significance over timescales beyond the Anthropocene. Our results validate this concept and open the possibility of its application to other species, facilitating species management, thus informing biodiversity conservation. Keywords: sea turtles, bioarchaeology, stable isotope analysis, paleoproteomics, historical ecology