Diving with green sea turtles off Cook Island, northern NSW

Surfers are braving the winter cold in Sydney, but off the northern NSW coast, temperatures are just perfect for diving with turtles.

Diving with turtles at Cook Island. Picture: Luke Marsden

While surfers in wetsuits are braving the freezing winter water off Sydney, turtles off the coast of far northern NSW are lapping up the perfect conditions.

“Turt-ally awesome” temperatures of over 20C are forecast for the rest of July along most of the coast, including Cook Island — where these pictures were taken — which is off Fingal Head just south of the Tweed.

That is well within the ideal recommended range for the shelled sea creatures. Australia is “lucky” to be home to six of the seven species of turtles in the world, including the green sea turtle, loggerhead turtles and the critically endangered hawksbill.

Diving with turtles at Cook Island on the NSW north coast. Picture: Luke Marsden

“For the first 15 years of their life, they’re basically travelling the world, going around the Pacific,” Cooly Eco Tours turtle dive instructor Georgie Pierce said.

“After that 15 years, they come back to where they hatched from and, when they reach sexual maturity at the age of 35, they actually lay their eggs on the same beaches that they actually hatched on.”

Diving with turtles at Cook Island. Picture: Luke Marsden

Despite happily feeding off seagrass, jellyfish and macro-algae day to day, Australian turtles are under threat.

“Turtles have a lot of threats, the biggest threat is plastic pollution because they do feed on jellyfish and a plastic bag looks super-similar to a jellyfish,” she said.

Georgie Pierce takes people diving with turtles at Cook Island. Picture: Luke Marsden

“This would be the cause of a lot of deaths for turtles. We’re lucky enough to be able to swim with the turtles there (off Cook Island) all year round. Mating starts in October (and) November and then they start hatching around the beginning of January all the way through to April.”

Diving with turtles at Cook Island. Picture: Luke Marsden

Diving with turtles at Cook Island. Picture: Luke Marsden