The hawksbill is the turtle behind tortoiseshell, and in the eastern Pacific it was nearly traded out of existence. Scientists once feared it was gone from the region; today juveniles are known to live on the rocky reefs and in the mangroves of Baja California Sur, though around Cabo it’s a rare sight.
A narrow head ending in a pointed, hawk-like beak with a V-shaped lower jaw. The shell is mottled amber, orange, red, yellow, brown and black, with thick scutes that overlap like roof tiles and a serrated rear edge. Two pairs of scales between the eyes and four scutes along each side of the shell.
Hawksbills live in tropical and subtropical waters of the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. Western Mexico is their northern limit in the eastern Pacific, and research suggests the Mexican Pacific turtles form a separate management unit because they move so little. The region’s largest nesting strongholds are in El Salvador and Nicaragua, where females nest on open beaches and also inside mangrove estuaries. Young hawksbills found in the Gulf of California and on Baja’s Pacific coast are thought to come from the small nesting groups in Jalisco, Nayarit and the Tres Marías Islands.
Hawksbills are the only sea turtle that can live mainly on sponges, though they also eat algae, corals, mollusks, sea urchins, jellyfish and small fish; in eastern Pacific mangroves they also eat mangrove seeds. They take 20 to 35 years to mature and may live 50 to 60. Females nest every 1 to 5 years, laying three to five nests a season with an average of 130 to 160 eggs each.
By the 2000s experts feared the eastern Pacific hawksbill was close to disappearing. In 2008 they met in El Salvador and formed ICAPO, the Eastern Pacific Hawksbill Initiative. From 2007 to mid-2009, Mexico accounted for 60% of all at-sea sightings in the region.
Source ↗Elsewhere, adult hawksbills live on open-coast coral reefs. But 10 of 12 adult females tracked by satellite in El Salvador, Nicaragua and Ecuador settled inside mangrove estuaries, often in canals less than 50 m wide.
Source ↗Hawksbills have been recorded at 52 sites in northwest Mexico, and 94% were juveniles. On the Baja peninsula, 73% of the 290 turtles recorded came from Isla San José and the Espíritu Santo archipelago; Cabo Pulmo is also on the list.
Source ↗GPS tags on 12 hawksbills in the Gulf of California showed tiny home ranges, about 3.8 km² on average. Most locations were in or near mangrove estuaries, and one turtle stayed at Isla San José for 829 days.
Source ↗In the Caribbean, hawksbills feed almost entirely on sponges, including some that are toxic to other vertebrates. Their diet contains more silica, the glassy material in sponge skeletons, than that of other vertebrates.
Source ↗Older fishermen said hawksbills were abundant in the Gulf of California until the 1950s. A small crew could catch 5 to 7 in a few hours of night fishing off Baja’s east coast, and the shell went to a local prison where inmates made jewelry.
Source ↗Around Los Cabos a hawksbill is a lucky, rare sighting, most likely on rocky reefs while snorkeling or diving, as at Cabo Pulmo. Farther up the Gulf, around Isla San José and Espíritu Santo, juveniles are more regular. Watch quietly from a distance; never chase, touch or feed one, and slow the boat down if you see a turtle at the surface.
If a turtle takes a bait, don’t yank it or haul it up by the line. Bring it alongside slowly; if it’s small enough, lift it with a net or by the shell, keeping hands away from its sharp beak and flippers. Otherwise cut the line as short as possible and let it go. By law, every turtle goes back in the water, and injured or entangled turtles can be reported to PROFEPA.
| Mexico (NOM-059) | In danger of extinction (P) |
|---|---|
| Total ban since 1990 (DOF) | No catching, chasing, disturbing or harming sea turtles, and no taking eggs. Turtles caught by accident must go back in the water |
| Federal Penal Code, art. 420 | 1 to 9 years in prison for capturing, harming or killing a sea turtle or taking its products |
| IUCN Red List | Critically Endangered globally (2008) |
| U.S. Endangered Species Act | Endangered (listed 1970; under the ESA since 1973) |
| CITES | Appendix I since 1977: no international trade, including tortoiseshell |
The green turtle has a smooth shell whose scutes don’t overlap and a small, rounded head with a single pair of scales between the eyes. The loggerhead has a very large head and a reddish-brown shell with five side scutes, and the olive ridley is smaller, with a rounder, olive shell and usually five or more side scutes. The hawksbill is the one with the narrow, pointed beak and overlapping scutes.
No. Tortoiseshell comes from hawksbills, and taking or keeping sea turtle products is a federal crime in Mexico. CITES has banned international trade since 1977, so pieces can also be seized at the border.
No. All sea turtles have been under a total ban in Mexico since 1990. Hawksbill meat can also be poisonous: in Micronesia in 2010, 101 people fell ill and 6 died after eating one hawksbill.
Don’t pull it up by the line. Bring it in slowly, lift it with a net or by the shell if it’s small, or cut the line as short as possible and release it.
Top illustration: Top Anglers. Photos: iNaturalist contributors, credited on each photo.
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