Location: Masirah, Oman
Date: June 21, 2026
Specialists at the Environment Authority Center in the Wilayat of Masirah, South Al Sharqiyah Governorate,
recorded a female loggerhead sea turtle during routine field monitoring activities on the beach in the Al Aijah area.
Ghazi bin Hamad Al Farsi, Environmental Monitoring Supervisor at the Environment Center in Masirah, said that the turtle
had been fitted with an identification tag 12 years ago during the 2014 nesting season at the same location. This sighting
adds to the documented records of returning marine turtles on Masirah’s beaches.
He explained that the return of the female turtle to the beach confirms a well-established scientific behavior of this species,
known as site fidelity, whereby loggerhead turtles exhibit a strong attachment to their original nesting sites.
Al Farsi noted that the observation also indicates that the female remains reproductively active despite more than a decade
having passed since her last documented record.
This sighting has been recorded as part of the field data for the 2026 loggerhead turtle nesting season and has been added to
the database of tagged individuals maintained by the Environment Authority
as part of its long-term nesting beach management program on Masirah Island.
