HATCHLINGS: The Lives of Baby Turtles

In Green Turtle Mysteries (1972) Waters talks about how green turtles journey home to lay their eggs and about scientists' attempts to trace their routes. This starts with a mother green turtle laying 100 eggs and flatly traces one hatchling to the water as all 99 others are snapped up by night herons, ghost crabs, sharks, kingfish, and people in a fishing boat. (All the predators are merely named, not described; few are pictured.) The same procedure is followed for a snapping-turtle hatchling on Cape Cod (nine of 23 eggs make. it to the pond), a painted-turtle hatchling in Wisconsin (all six reach the pond but all are then removed by children and only our hero makes it back), a leatherneck-turtle hatchling in Malaysia (22 of 154 reach the sea), and a Texas box-turtle hatchling who heads for the woods instead of a pond. Aside from the high drop-out rate very little is conveyed. Waters' account is as plodding as the turtles' progress and his focus on one hatchling for each clutch doesn't pick up the story.