With the help of the turtles like Helen and Sherman we have been able to learn through satellite tracking a little about where our leatherback turtles go when they leave Nova Scotian waters. With the help of a tiny skin sample from a turtle, we can find out where our sea turtles are from.

A female leatherback turtle nesting on a beach in Trinidad

Using "genetic tags," or sections of the DNA in the skin samples, we can begin to match the DNA of Nova Scotia turtles with the DNA of turtles found on nesting beaches in South and Central America.

 Because female turtles on nesting beaches are closely related, we should be able to determine which beaches our Nova Scotian turtles use to nest.

Tagging       Distribution