Green Sea Turtle Research Paper

(source)Evolution: “the process where different kinds of living organism are believed to have developed from earlier forms during the history of the earth.” Over time all of earths creatures have evolved to not only deal with predators but to deal with the changing earth. It is either evolve to survive or die. Many creatures went extinct along with the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Though there are still many reptiles alive today because of how they evolved when the need was there. Though turtles started their adaptions 260 million years ago when the first sub-turtle generation came to be, they where able to take back into the water and avoid the great extinction. Since that time the sub-turtle race had branched off and created two other …show more content…
The green sea turtle is in the class of ‘Reptilia’, meaning they are reptiles, with cold blood. This is the same between the green sea turtle and the tortoise. Only when the green sea turtle breaks away from other reptiles is in the family classification. (source) This is when the green sea turtle goes into the sea turtle category, this is called the ‘Cheloniidae’ all bar one sea turtle fall into this (source) one of two families the sea turtles in this family all have shells covered with scutes (horny plates). The other family for the sea turtles is called the Dermochelyidae; which houses the leather back turtle because instead of a shell covered in scutes they have a leathery skin. Which assists in finding shelter in smaller spaces that hard shelled sea turtles would not fit, but leaves them more venerable to attack. And so each different species forms its own way to defend itself, and pass on what it learnt through its genetic code to the next …show more content…
Some of the similarities between the three species would be (source) that they all have shells, are cold-blooded or (eco-therms) which is an inclusive term for most reptiles, lay eggs on land and breathe air. The reason for their adaptions and differences would be because of their living environment. For example, besides sea turtles, all other Cryptodiva are considered tortoises. Though while in the United States, any Cryptodiva that live near the water are given the name of ‘turtle’. Some differences between the species are that turtles are more accustomed to aquatic life being stream lined and having webbed claw like flippers. While tortoises have a larger rounded shell to provide better protection from possible threats and have stubby limbs with sharp claws designed for digging; they are also exclusively land based animals and have been know to drown in deep water or if there is a current. Terrapins though are semi-aquatic making them able to survive in both environments and have been known reside in black water or swamps. (source) Terrapins, though have a hard dome-like shell are much smaller than their close relative the

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