Image of the Day: Why Did the Turtles Cross the Road?
Why did the turtles cross the road? To escape climate change. As if baby leatherback turtles didn’t have it rough enough, climate change is threatening the critically endangered leatherback sea turtles in the Pacific. When conditions are hot and dry, researchers at Drexel University in Philadelphia discovered eggs desiccate as the sand baked in the sun, and the baby turtles were unable to break through the packed, scalding sand. Another problem is that hot conditions produce mostly females, and then those surviving babies are predominantly female, tipping the population mix.
