75-pound sea turtle washes ashore at Manzanita carrying ‘whole ecosystem’

SEASIDE Ore. (KPTV) - A 75-pound dead sea turtle washed ashore on Saturday at the south end of Manzanita beach, according to the Seaside Aquarium on Facebook.

The aquarium said they retrieved the carcass and identified it as a loggerhead sea turtle.

“This ocean-going turtle had a whole ecosystem traveling with it,” they said.

When they cleaned the shell to identify the turtle, they found live gooseneck barnacles, skeleton shrimp and even nudibranchs (a type of sea slug.)

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“While the Oregon Coast is no stranger to sea turtles, the species usually encountered are Olive Ridleys,” they said. “Loggerheads are quite rare for this area.”

Loggerheads are endangered but can be found worldwide and have nine distinct populations. In the Pacific there are two different populations which both nest exclusively in the Japanese Archipelago, they said. Juveniles forage, develop, and mature in the East, West, and Central Pacific. Some of the most productive foraging grounds can be found off the coast of Baja California.

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Dead sea turtle washes ashore at Manzanita carrying ‘whole ecosystem’(Tiffany Boothe/Seaside Aquarium)

One of the biggest threats to loggerhead sea turtles is marine debris. The aquarium said that according to NOAA, “Foraging loggerheads respond similarly to the odors of prey items and biofouled plastic, the scent of which stimulates foraging behavior and contributes to turtles’ detrimental (and often fatal) interactions with marine debris.”

The aquarium will preform a necropsy to attempt to determine the cause of death.