History of Sea turtle in Timeline

By Popular Timelines Editorial Team · Updated: March 13, 2026

Sea turtles are reptiles belonging to the order Testudines. There are seven extant species: flatback, green, hawksbill, leatherback, loggerhead, Kemp's ridley, and olive ridley. Worryingly, five of these species are classified as threatened with extinction on the IUCN Red List. The flatback turtle, which isn't threatened, inhabits only the waters of Australia, Papua New Guinea, and Indonesia.

1987: Carr's discovery of Sargassum mats

In 1987, Carr discovered that young green and loggerhead sea turtles spent a great deal of their pelagic lives in floating sargassum mats, where they found ample shelter and food.

September 2007: Apprehension of Chinese poachers

In September 2007, several Chinese poachers were apprehended off the Turtle Islands in the Philippines. They had collected more than a hundred sea turtles, along with 10,000 sea turtle eggs.

September 2007: Record number of Kemp's ridley sea turtle nests

In September 2007, wildlife officials in Corpus Christi, Texas, found a record number of 128 Kemp's ridley sea turtle nests on Texas beaches, including 81 on North Padre Island and four on Mustang Island.

2007: Reich's determination of hatchling life

In 2007, Reich determined that green sea turtle hatchlings spend the first three to five years of their lives in pelagic waters, feeding on zooplankton and smaller nekton before moving to inshore seagrass meadows as obligate herbivores.

2007: Sea turtle deaths in the Bay of Bengal

In early 2007, almost a thousand sea turtles were killed inadvertently in the Bay of Bengal over the course of a few months after being caught in fisherman's nets and unable to surface to breathe.

2010: Report on sea turtle life cycles

A 2010 United States National Research Council report concluded that more detailed information on sea turtles' life cycles, such as birth rates and mortality, is needed to accurately assess sea turtle populations.

2012: US listing status of the loggerhead sea turtle is under review

As of 2012, the US listing status of the loggerhead sea turtle is under review.

2015: Fluorescence observed in marine creatures

According to Gruber and Sparks in 2015, fluorescence is observed in an increasing number of marine creatures (cnidarians, ctenophores, annelids, arthropods, and chordates) and is now also considered to be widespread in cartilaginous and ray-finned fishes.

2015: First fluorescence observed in a marine tetrapod

In 2015, Gruber and Sparks observed the first fluorescence in a marine tetrapod (four-limbed vertebrates), making sea turtles the first biofluorescent reptile found in the wild.

2015: Olive ridley sea turtle with plastic straw

In 2015, an olive ridley sea turtle was found with a plastic drinking straw lodged inside its nose. The video of Nathan J. Robinson has helped raise considerable awareness about the threat posed by plastic pollution to sea turtles.

August 2017: Stable isotope analysis of sea turtles

As at August 2017, about 69% of studies using stable isotope analysis to understand the foraging distribution of sea turtles have been conducted in RMUs listed as "least concern" by the IUCN.

January 2018: Sea turtle gender change due to climate change

The Current Biology study in January 2018 titled "Environmental Warning and Feminization of One of the Largest Sea Turtle Populations in the World" showed a significant increase in female sea turtle births compared to male births due to climate change. Scientists found a 99% female population from blood samples taken near the Great Barrier Reef.

2019: Phylogenetic relationships of sea turtles

In 2019, the phylogenetic relationships of living and extinct sea turtles in the Chelonioidea were determined.

2020: Increase in sea turtle nesting due to COVID-19

In 2020, there was an increase in sea turtle nesting due to diminished human activity resulting from the COVID-19 virus. Thailand and Florida saw abnormally high numbers of nests. This could be attributed to less plastic and light pollution.

2022: Alternative phylogeny proposed

In 2022, Castillo-Visa et al. proposed an alternate phylogeny of sea turtles.

2022: Description of Leviathanochelys

In 2022, the giant fossil species Leviathanochelys, a true sea turtle of the superfamily Chelonioidea, was described from Spain. It lived in the oceans covering Europe during the Late Cretaceous and was one of the largest turtles to ever exist, rivaling the giant protostegids of the time.