Sea turtles have no idea where they are going and rely on sheer luck to migrate.
Sea turtles have no idea where they are going
Scientists fitted 22 hawksbill turtles with GPS trackers to see how they found their way home after mating and breeding.
Experts at The Royal Society said: "Our results provide compelling evidence that hawksbill turtles only have a relatively crude map sense in the open ocean."
The findings revealed that the reptiles, which are based in the Indian Ocean, took various detours and often travelled further than they needed to.
One turtle event went 812 miles to find an island that was just 109 miles away.
The study authors wrote: "The navigational imperfection of turtles was evident right at the start of their oceanic migration, with their initial departure directions tending not to be target orientated, as if often the case with birds."