Jennifer Bové - I Wish I Was a Sea Turtle

What if you wished you were
a sea turtle?
Then you became a green sea turtle.
Could you swim like a sea turtle?
Eat like a sea turtle?
Spend most of your life underwater?
And would you want to? Find out!

Where would you live?
Green sea turtles live
in warm oceans around the world.
They live underwater,
except when it is time to lay eggs.

Mother turtles leave the water
to lay their eggs on sandy beaches.

Have you ever
visited an ocean?

How would your life begin?
A mother sea turtle clears away
sand with her front flippers
and digs a hole
with her back flippers.

This hole is a nest where she lays
about one hundred eggs.

The mother sea turtle
covers the eggs with sand
and goes back to the ocean.
Sand hides the eggs
from hungry animals.

Two months later, the eggs hatch.
The baby turtles wiggle
their way out of the sand.

Baby turtles are called hatchlings.
When hatchlings leave the nest,
they race toward the ocean
as fast as their flippers will go.

Tiny turtles are not safe on land.
Gulls and other sea birds
might catch them.

Where would you go?
Baby sea turtles
swim way out into the ocean.
They live far from land.
When the sea turtles get bigger,
they move to shallow water
near ocean shores.

How would you breathe?
Sea turtles live underwater,
but they need to breathe air.
They stick their faces
out of the water to breathe.

When sea turtles are sleeping,
they can stay underwater
for five hours
without taking a breath!

Can you hold your
breath underwater?

Where would you sleep?
Sea turtles sleep underwater.
Sometimes they nap while floating.

Sea turtles tuck themselves
under rock ledges
to sleep safely at night.

What would you eat?
Green sea turtles eat seagrasses,
seaweed, and other plants
that grow in the ocean.
Their sharp beaks help them
eat these plants.

Have you ever eaten
seaweed?

How would you wash up?
Sea turtles do not get dirty.
But plants grow on their shells
and tiny bugs crawl on their skin.
Those things can be itchy!
Fish nibble off the bugs and plants.
Their nibbling helps keep
sea turtles clean and comfortable.

How would growing up change you?
Green sea turtles are fully grown
when they are twenty years old.
Then they are ready for migration.

Migration means that turtles
paddle hundreds of miles
back to the same beaches
where they hatched.

Sea turtles migrate to find mates.
The female turtles lay eggs.
Then all the adult turtles
swim back to the places
where they can find
their favorite foods.

Have you ever been
far from home?