Abstract:
The diamondback turtle has survived for thousands of years, but the 19th- and 20th centuries challenged its existence. In the 19th-century, over-harvesting depleted fisheries to satisfy gourmet tastes for turtle meat. In the 20th-century, lost crab pots entrap and kill the turtles, while sprawling coastal development destroys its habitat. It is this loss of habitat that threatens the diamondback most in the 21st-century.