Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff, I'm more in vogel Bomb and this episode
Speaker 1: is a classic from our archives. Over the past few years,
Speaker 1: we've all seen changes to expected weather patterns. There have
Speaker 1: been more hurricanes in some areas, more droughts, and others
Speaker 1: warmer winters. Here in Atlanta, where we produce this show,
Speaker 1: some of these effects of climate change are pretty obvious,
Speaker 1: but this episode is about one that's more subtle, if
Speaker 1: just as big, the difference in how some sea turtles
Speaker 1: are being born. Hey brain stuffling vocal bomb here. Australia's
Speaker 1: Great Barrier Reef is an enormous climate change experiment that's
Speaker 1: not happening in the safe isolation of a laboratory. Instead,
Speaker 1: the warming waters off the east coast of the continent
Speaker 1: have a profound real world effect on thousands of miles
Speaker 1: of coral as well as the animals that live there.
Speaker 1: For decades, scientists have suspected that increases in ocean's temperatures
Speaker 1: would affect sex ratios in certain animals, and rese it
Speaker 1: shows that's exactly what's happening to the Pacific Green sea turtles.
Speaker 1: In most of Earth's creatures, gender is determined during the
Speaker 1: fertilization process. That's not true of animals like turtles, crocodiles,
Speaker 1: and alligators, though, which rely on a concept called temperature
Speaker 1: dependent sex determination, or TDS to dictate the sex of
Speaker 1: their offspring. In the case of turtles, warming waters and
Speaker 1: sands are altering the TDS process During the breeding season.
Speaker 1: The turtles, which can grow to nearly five hundred pounds
Speaker 1: that's about two kims, with a shell diameter of four
Speaker 1: feet or one point two meters, flop ashore and bury
Speaker 1: their eggs in the sand. The temperature of that sand
Speaker 1: determines whether baby turtles will wind up with blue or
Speaker 1: pink flippers. Figuratively speaking, if the incubation temperature is below
Speaker 1: eighty two degrees fahrenheit or thirty degrees celsius, the turtles
Speaker 1: will hatch as males. Above eighty eight degrees fahrenheit or
Speaker 1: thirty one degree celsius, the babies will be female. A
Speaker 1: similar problem has been reported in loggerhead turtles on Florida beaches,
Speaker 1: since scientists have noticed a strong bias toward female turtles
Speaker 1: in some instances. Up to to see how varying temperatures
Speaker 1: might affect turtle populations. Scientists compared sex ratios of turtles
Speaker 1: near multiple breeding grounds around the Great Barrier Reef. They
Speaker 1: used blood tests and laparro scopy to determine the sex
Speaker 1: of these animals. At the southern edge of the reef,
Speaker 1: near Brisbane, water temperatures are cooler and female turtles outnumber
Speaker 1: males by a ratio of two to one, about sixty
Speaker 1: five to sixty nine percent female. However, about one thousand,
Speaker 1: two hundred miles north, in the largest and most critical
Speaker 1: sea turtle rookery in the Pacific Ocean, warmer sea and
Speaker 1: air temperatures are having a dramatic effect of hatchlings are female.
Speaker 1: Although each male can mate with more than one female
Speaker 1: during a breeding season, a severe imbalance in sex ratios
Speaker 1: doesn't bode well for temperature sensitive species like sea turtles. Furthermore,
Speaker 1: once the incubating sand becomes too warm, it outright kills
Speaker 1: the developing organism, further threatening turtle populations. The study was
Speaker 1: published in January eighteen in the journal Cell Biology. The
Speaker 1: researchers write, our study highlights the need for immediate management
Speaker 1: strategies aimed at lowering incubation temperatures at key rookeries to
Speaker 1: boost the ability of local turtle populations to adapt to
Speaker 1: the changing environment and avoid a population collapse or even extinction.
Speaker 1: Today's episode was originally produced by Tristan McNeil and is
Speaker 1: based on the article of Great Barrier Reef Green sea
Speaker 1: turtles are hatching female on how stuff works dot Com,
Speaker 1: written by Nathan Chandler. Brain Stuff is production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio in partnership with how stuff works dot Com
Speaker 1: and is produced by Tyler Clang. Four more podcasts my
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