Published in the journal ECOLOGY in 2021, the paper "Animal‐borne video from a sea turtle reveals novel anti‐predator behaviors" describes an opportunistic observation of novel aggressive anti-predator behavioural strategies by flatback turtles.
With an Altmetric Attention Score of 773 (a high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention), this paper is ranked the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked! Altmetric tracks ALL published research outputs across ALL online sources (over 23 million to date!).
TALK ABOUT GOING VIRAL!!!
A predatory interaction between an adult flatback turtle and a tiger shark on the seafloor was captured from the turtles perspective using an animal-borne video camera/multi-sensor data logger by Customized Animal Tracking Solutions. Who do you think would come off best in this interaction?! Watch a clip here (but for the full video and to find out what happens next, head to the link in the paper):
The one-of-a-kind footage shows how contemporary technologies have an important place in the study of animal behaviour. The sea turtles' characteristic carapace only somewhat protects these animals from predation, and tiger sharks love a turtle dinner, but now we know they aren’t always the victim. As the video reveals, they can successfully defend themselves by launching a counter-attack on approaching sharks!
As well as being able to watch this interaction from this unique 'ringside' perspective, the high-resolution tri-axial accelerometer & magnetometer data concurrently recorded by the CATS tag allowed this interaction to be reconstructed in 3D. Below, the 7 minute dive is coloured by the turtles' locomotory activity level - check out the high activity and degree of turning as the shark approached on the seafloor!
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