D: Hello! Today I’m going to be talking about giant green sea turtles – and specifically one called Ernie [picture].
This amazing creature can live for up to 150 years – almost as old as your mum and dad!
Giant green sea turtles can be much much bigger than Ernie, who is about half as big as your car – and he is only 11!
Do you want to know why he’s called a GREEN sea turtle? Well, it’s because he eats lots of seaweed and greens – including brussel sprouts and broccoli – bleurgh! I don’t SEA (get it?) how he can eat those things. But, luckily (probably to take the taste away) he eats sea creatures like jelly fish.
The reason why his species are greatly endangered is because they eat plastic bags like children eat fast food – because he mistakes this rubbish for jelly fish, floating on top of the water. It gets right into their guts and it takes ages to break down – as you’ll know from learning about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
This makes the turtles think they are full, but they’re not getting any nutrition from the bags at all, so they die. And then….REST IN PEACE turtles [rip picture].
Mum: Have a look at these videos from the other day.
Dylan: We could do Tickled Pink, Green for Growth with it!
Mum: What’s that?
Dylan: When you say two things that are nice about it and one thing that you could do to make it better next time. We do it at school, every morning at circle time when people talk about their things they’ve made.
Mum: That sounds like a great idea! Go on then – two things you like about the videos.
Dylan: I like that they had dolphins in them and they were nice and clear.
Mum: Thank you, and one thing I could do better?
Dylan: Ummm. Maybe next time you could take the video when people were quieter.
Mum: Perhaps I could take the sound off and play some music over it…
Boy: It’s in The Little Mermaid – there’s this crown that her granny has arranged for her and it lets her breathe so she can go out of the sea and it says on that day, dawn broke.
Mum: Ah! It’s a time of day – “dawn” is just before the sun shows up and you say “dawn breaks” when the sun comes up over the horizon and the day starts.
Son: Yes, after Gran Canaria, can we go back to Crete?
Mum: We’ll see. I’d like to visit different countries. We could go to Egypt and you might be able to swim well enough to come snorkelling and see all the pretty fish under the water.
Son: But what about the sharks?
Mum: You don’t need to worry about sharks.
Son: I just imagined something! I imagined that we were in the sea and a shark was chasing us and we ran out of the sea onto the beach and the shark followed us – he stood on his flippers and walked onto the beach and then started singing “Gangnam Style” with a microphone!
D: I wanted to draw under the sea – and the gems are treasure! There’s an island with a palm tree and treasure on it [bottom left]; those things that look like ‘B’s are the waves; and there are stars all around.
Me: Diving INTO the water’s not allowed, but I’m talking about diving UNDER the water – sub aqua diving. I used to do that – it was great! There’s a whole different world under the sea – like in Finding Nemo, with all kinds of fishes swimming past.
D: Did you want to see a shark?
Me: Only if it was quite far away.
D: I bet you didn’t want to see a HUMPBACK WHALE? They’re the biggest creature in this world!
Me: Only if they were quite far away too.
D: Are they bigger than the sea?
Me: No – otherwise how would they fit IN the sea?!
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