Sea Turtles of Bermuda | Watford Studios

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All sea turtles are protected in Bermuda. Bermuda once had a large nesting population of green turtles, but they were wiped out centuries ago by over-harvesting; there has been no regular nesting since, and the green turtles seen today are juveniles that drifted here from nesting beaches in the Caribbean and Florida and stay for some years before leaving to breed. The Bermuda Turtle Project has studied them for more than 50 years. If you take a boat out, go slowly over the seagrass and in the bays, as turtles come up to breathe.

Key: found only in Bermuda endemic native arrived naturally migrant visitor passes through, does not live here introduced brought in by people protected protected by Bermuda law (Bermuda’s protected species: Protected Species Act 2003 and Fisheries (Protected Species) Order 1978) around the cottages you may see it at Watford Studios

Around the cottages

Green turtle: Often seen in Mangrove Bay, coming up to breathe.

Bermuda’s sea turtles

Green turtle Chelonia mydasnativeprotectedaround the cottagesThe turtle you are most likely to see, grazing in seagrass beds and bays. Numbers fell sharply around 2020 as Bermuda’s seagrass declined.Around the cottages: Often seen in Mangrove Bay, coming up to breathe.Photo: Watford Studios (Just off the beach at Sugar Cane Cottage, 10 June 2019)

Hawksbill turtle Eretmochelys imbricatanativeprotectedSeen on the coral reefs. A narrow, hawk-like beak and a beautiful shell of overlapping plates.Photo: Iván Cumpián (CC BY)

Loggerhead turtle Caretta carettanativeprotectedOccasionally seen offshore. A big head and a reddish-brown shell; young loggerheads drift with the floating Sargassum weed.Photo: Jan Ebr & Ivana Ebrová (CC BY)

Leatherback turtle Dermochelys coriaceanativeprotectedThe world’s largest turtle, with a leathery, ridged back instead of a hard shell. A rare visitor to Bermuda’s offshore waters.Photo: Pam Kleinsasser (CC BY)

Kemp’s ridley turtle Lepidochelys kempiinativeprotectedThe smallest and rarest sea turtle in the world; only very rarely recorded in Bermuda.Photo: Zihao Wang (CC BY)

Where to see them

Young green turtles feed on seagrass in the sheltered bays and harbours, so you can often spot them from a dock, a kayak or a boat: watch for a small head popping up to breathe. Snorkellers and divers see them over the seagrass and along the inshore reefs, and hawksbills turn up on the coral reefs themselves. Loggerheads and leatherbacks are mostly seen well offshore.

Watching turtles

Look, don’t touch: never chase, ride or feed a turtle.
Give them room to come up for air; if one surfaces near you, stay still and let it go on its way.
Boats: go slowly over seagrass and in the bays, where turtles are hit by propellers.
Take fishing line, hooks and plastic bags home — turtles swallow them and get tangled in them.

If you find a turtle that is injured, tangled or stranded, contact the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum & Zoo, which looks after sick and injured sea turtles. The Bermuda Turtle Project has been catching, measuring, tagging and releasing turtles here for more than 50 years.

Protected since 1620

When the first settlers arrived in 1609 turtles were so plentiful that they quickly became a staple food, and within a few years the young ones were being taken faster than they could grow. In 1620 the Bermuda Assembly passed “An Act agaynst the killinge of ouer young Tortoyses”, which banned taking turtles under 18 inches across in the waters around the island. It is regarded as one of the earliest written conservation laws in the New World; only Governor Daniel Tucker’s 1616 proclamation against “the spoyle and havocke of the Cahowes” came before it.

Even so, turtles went on being caught for food for another 350 years, and they had all but stopped nesting on Bermuda’s beaches by the early twentieth century. The minimum size was raised in 1963, the Fisheries Act 1972 ended turtle fishing altogether, and today every species of sea turtle in Bermuda waters is protected under the Protected Species Act 2003.

Hatchlings in St. George’s, 2015

Between 1968 and 1978 more than 25,000 green turtle eggs from Costa Rica were buried on Bermuda beaches, in the hope that the turtles would one day come back to nest. In August 2015 one seems to have done just that. Early one morning a resident found a baby green turtle crossing Barry Road in St. George’s; more hatchlings turned up on the beach at Building’s Bay and Alexandra Battery, and Aquarium staff found a nest of almost 90 hatched eggs — believed to be the first green turtles born on a Bermuda beach in about 100 years. Many of the hatchlings had headed inland towards the street lights instead of out to sea, so a number were rescued from the grass and released by hand.

A loggerhead nest on Cooper’s Island in 2005 also produced hatchlings, after the eggs were moved indoors to escape a tropical storm’s surge.

Seen turtle tracks or a nest?

Nesting is still very rare here, so every nest matters. If you see turtle tracks or hatchlings on a beach, keep your distance, don’t shine lights on them, and contact the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum & Zoo straight away.

Photos are from iNaturalist (taken in Bermuda wherever an openly licensed photo exists), used under their Creative Commons or public-domain licences; click a credit to see the original. Facts from the Bermuda Department of Environment and Natural Resources (environment.bm). If you see a Bermuda skink, a terrapin or a bat, the Department would like to hear about it.

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