Sex distribution of the green sea turtle hatchlings

Methods

Summary

There will be multiple methods used while conducting this research. First, we will hire local guides and SCUBA dive in three different reefs off of the coast of Oahu, Maui and Kauai in search of adult sea turtles and to take and calculate the adult sex ratio. Next, we plan to locate nests of each of the green sea turtle nests that are being studied about two months before their projected hatching time period (which is in August) and monitor the conditions they are in until hatching begins. Things to monitor would include average sand temperature, pollution, ocean acidity and salinity. Next, would be to take the average hatchling gender ratio and then compare it to that of fifty years ago (conditions and gender ratio) and search relevant primary literature.

Challenges

It may be difficult not to disturb the nests, so we will be very careful when surveying. Also, we will use local guides in order to look for the nests more efficiently. We also need to make sure local groups are aware of our activity so that they don't interfere or think we are disturbing the nests without cause. 

Pre Analysis Plan

We plan to compare the data that we take to data that was taken around fifty years ago. We will normalize our data and perform a chi squared analysis with p-value in order to accurately compare our data to data sets from 50 years ago. We will use weather almanacs to see how temperature has increased over the past 50 years and perform a statistical analysis to see if the increase is significant.