Volker Koch William M. Megill Raymond R. Carthy R.obert P. Templeton Wallace J. Nichols Jesse Senko 2010 <p>Green turtles spend most of their lives in coastal foraging areas where they face multiple anthropogenic impacts. Therefore, understanding their spatial use in this environment is a priority for conservation efforts. We studied the fine scale daily movements and habitat use of East Pacific green turtles (<i>Chelonia mydas</i>) at Laguna San Ignacio, a shallow coastal lagoon in Baja California Sur, Mexico where sea turtles are subject to high levels of gillnet bycatch and directed hunting. Six turtles ranging from 44.6 to 83.5&nbsp;cm in straight carapace length were tracked for short deployments (1 to 6 d) with GPS-VHF telemetry. Turtles were active throughout diurnal, nocturnal, and crepuscular periods. Although they moved greater total distances during daytime, their speed of travel and net displacement remained consistent throughout 24-h periods. A positive selection for areas of seagrass and moderate water depth (5 to 10&nbsp;m) was determined using Ivlev's electivity index, with neutral selection for shallow water (&lt;&nbsp;5&nbsp;m) and avoidance of deep water (&gt;&nbsp;10&nbsp;m). Turtles exhibited two distinct behavioral movement patterns: circular movements with high fidelity to the capture&ndash;release location and meandering movements with low fidelity to the capture&ndash;release location. Our results indicate that green turtles were active throughout the diel cycle while traveling large distances and traversing multiple habitats over short temporal scales.</p> application/pdf 10.1016/j.jembe.2010.06.017 en Elsevier Fine scale daily movements and habitat use of East Pacific green turtles at a shallow coastal lagoon in Baja California Sur, Mexico article