title: Marine turtles used to assist Austronesian sailors reaching new islands.
abstract: Austronesians colonized the islands of Rapa Nui, Hawaii, the Marquesas and Madagascar. All of these islands have been found to harbor Austronesian artifacts and also, all of them are known nesting sites for marine turtles. Turtles are well known for their transoceanic migrations, sometimes totalling thousands of miles, between feeding and nesting grounds. All marine turtles require land for nesting. Ancient Austronesians are known to have had outstanding navigation skills, which they used to adjust course directions. But these skills will have been insufficient to locate tiny, remote islands in the vast Indo-Pacific oceans. We postulate that the Austronesians must have had an understanding of the marine turtles' migration patterns and used this knowledge to locate remote and unknown islands. The depth and speed at which marine turtles migrate makes following them by outrigger canoes feasible. Humans have long capitalized on knowledge of animal behavior.
authors: University of Antananarivo, School of Agronomy, Water and Forest Department, BP 175, Antananarivo 101, Madagascar; Missouri Botanical Garden, Madagascar Research & Conservation Program, BP 3391, Antananarivo 101, Madagascar. Electronic address: lucienne.wilme@mobot-mg.org.
authors: Lucienne
authors: L
authors: Wilmé
authors: Forest Management and Development, Department of Environmental Sciences, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, 8092 Zurich, Switzerland. Electronic address: patrick.waeber@usys.ethz.ch.
authors: Patrick O
authors: PO
authors: Waeber
authors: Animal Ecology and Conservation, Hamburg University, 20146 Hamburg, Germany. Electronic address: ganzhorn@uni-hamburg.de.
authors: Joerg U
authors: JU
authors: Ganzhorn
mesh_terms: D025041:Animal Migration / Q000502:physiology*; D000818:Animals; D049690:History, Ancient; D006801:Humans; D008889:Military Personnel / Q000266:history*; D009425:Nesting Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D010139:Pacific Islands; D010140:Pacific Ocean; D065854:Spatial Navigation / Q000502:physiology*; D014426:Turtles / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Chelonians; Chéloniens; Colonisation; Colonization; Indian Ocean; Migration; Navigation hauturière; Océan Indien; Océan Pacifique; Pacific Ocean; Seafaring