"Urashima Taro"

Grupo Tortuguero: Pacific Sea Turtle Tracking

A project of Grupo Tortuguero Tracking Project.

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Species: Loggerhead
Life Stage: Juvenile
Gender: unknown
Release Date: 1999-07-25 00:00:00
Release Location: off Bahia Magdalena, Baja California Sur, Mexico
Last Location: 1999-10-08 15:43:19

Background

"Urashima Taro" is a juvenile loggerhead who was captured in the Pacific Ocean outside of Bahia Magdalena and released on 25 July 1999. This turtle is named after a young fisherman in a Japanese folk story who travels with a sea turtle to a beautiful, enchanting undersea world where he spends several years. When he returns to the land, as his misses his home, he finds that 300 years have passed and that no one remembers him. It strikes me that this story echoes that of the loggerheads' developmental migrations from Japan to Baja California and around the Pacific Ocean. The young loggerheads returning to Japan as adults after 30 years or so. However, when they return to Japan they will find that unlike Urashima they haven't been forgotten!