I found some suspicious-looking scales in fecal samples from a hawksbill turtle and am wondering if it is possibly from a sea snake.
Hawksbill turtles are known to be omnivorous. Captive individuals eat meat, so in the wild they would probably eat a dead sea snake if they encountered one. I encourage you to post a photo of the scale remains and indicate their locality of origin if you want confirmation of their identity, although it is not likely that a species identification will be possible.
Thanks Olivier. I've attached a picture. This came from a sample collected two days ago. How long does it usually take for a juvenile hawksbill to digest/pass its food? The turtle I collected from has been in captivity for a month now after it was found floating close to shore and barely moving. To my knowledge it has only been force fed mashed fish until last week, when it was brought to our lab and we gave it filleted fish. It appears to have a buoyancy problem and without an x-ray, am hoping to see if we can know more about its health from what it's fed on.
That does look very much like snake remains. As Olivier said, hawksbills are omnivores, and I have seen hawksbills scavenging on large fish carcasses in the wild (Bahamas). In terms of finding out about gut passage time, it might be useful to ask someone who works at an aquarium with a display of this species. I think they would perhaps have the best information on this.
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