individuals are gray dorsally and white ventrally. Immature 

 turtles may show strong, pointed tubercles on each side of the 

 vertebral scutes. The head is of medium size, roughly triangular 

 in shape when viewed from above and the carapace is noteworthy 

 for the unique proliferation of scutes — usually there are six or 

 more pairs of costal scutes, sometimes as many as nine; the 

 vertebrals usually typically number more than five. Each of the 

 enlarged inframarginal scutes in the bridge area (where the 

 plastron connects with the marginal scutes of the carapace) is 

 perforated by a small pore towards its posterior margin. Adult 

 turtles differ in coloration from the hatchlings and subadults, 

 having dark olive or greenish dorsal surfaces and light yellow on 

 the plastron and ventral aspects of the soft parts. 



Distribution : (1) Foraging areas. The olive ridley is a 

 strongly tropical species usually found within 100 km or so of 

 mainland shores. Very large populations exist in the eastern 

 Pacific, from Mexico south to Ecuador, and with representation in 

 northern Peru also. On the other hand, the species is scarce in 

 the western Pacific, although known from the Philippines, 

 Malaysia, northern Australia, and New Britain (Papua New Guinea) . 

 In the Indian Ocean the largest populations are in the Bay of 

 Bengal. The species occurs widely but apparently not 

 particularly abundantly in west Africa, whilst in the west 

 Atlantic the species is known from northern Brazil to eastern 

 Venezuela, and with occasional individuals extending far into the 

 Caribbean, to Colombia, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. 



(2) Nesting areas. In the western Atlantic, the olive 

 ridley nests in small numbers in northwestern Guyana and in 

 eastern Surinam and western French Guiana. The formerly 

 aggregated nesting at Eilanti, Surinam, is greatly diminished, 

 although it may have been replaced by growing numbers nesting 

 near Kourou, French Guiana. In the eastern Atlantic no areas of 

 massively concentrated nesting have been identified, but some 

 degree of nesting probably occurs from Senegal to Angola. In the 

 other oceans, spectacular nesting concentrations or "arribadas" 

 occur in the Bay of Bengal (two sites in Orissa, India) , in 

 Oaxaca, Mexico, and at two sites in Pacific Costa Rica, with some 

 lesser concentrations in Nicaragua and Panama. However, very 

 little nesting has been reported on the Pacific coast of South 

 America, although large numbers of individuals (mostly adults) 

 forage off the coast of Ecuador. 



Food habits ; Rather few data exist on the feeding 

 preferences of the olive ridley, which is surprising in view of 

 the economic importance of the species and the large numbers of 

 individuals taken by man. In the Atlantic and eastern Pacific, 

 the species appears to be carnivorous, feeding upon shrimp, small 

 crabs, fish eggs, and so on. Jellyfish, snails, and tunicates 

 may also be taken. In the Indian Ocean, on the other hand, 

 available information suggests that the species is herbivorous, 



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