THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, January 16, 1996 TAG: 9601160278
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LANE DEGREGORY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PEA ISLAND LENGTH: Long : 115 lines
Across the mid-Atlantic region, record numbers of freezing sea turtles are turning up sick.
With his right front flipper caked in blood and his diamond-patterned body lying limply on the bed of a pickup, the sea turtle didn't look like he was going to live.
A National Park Service ranger found the endangered animal washed up on this Outer Banks beach Monday morning. By lunch time, a volunteer had picked up the pillow-sized Kemp's ridley turtle and had driven it to a Roanoke Island veterinarian, who administered antibiotics and steroids to the young amphibian.
By late afternoon, the 10-pound turtle remained alive - hooked to a heart monitor, respirator and intravenous feeding device.
``It's in critical condition. But it's holding on for now,'' Dr. Mark Grossman said about 5 p.m. ``We've been seeing a lot of this lately. We've worked on six loggerheads in the last month. Most of the time, if people get them to us in time, we're successful in saving them.''
At least 10 endangered Kemp's ridley, threatened loggerhead and green sea turtles have washed up on Outer Banks shores since December. Last year, only four turtles came ashore in that area all year. In Virginia, six sea turtles washed up on the Eastern Shore in December. In New York, 76 turtles have been brought to Okeanos Ocean Research Foundation in Long Island, N.Y., over the past two months. The nonprofit group treated seven turtles last winter.
Across the mid-Atlantic region, the story is the same: Record numbers of sick sea turtles are turning up.
Biologists say the animals are the victims of cold currents that shock their circulation systems and slow them down so much that they can't swim.
The turtles have weighed between 10 pounds and 200 pounds and have ranged in age from 2 to 20 years old.
``We've seen a record number of cold-stunned turtles this year. They got hit really bad this season,'' Okeanos Stranding Coordinator Debra Spangler said Monday from her Long Island office. ``This has been the worst winter we've ever experienced in terms of how soon the temperature dropped and how long it's stayed cold.''
Sea turtles swim throughout the ocean in the summer. But when temperatures begin to cool off, they head for warmer waters. Most species of sea turtles like 60- to 80-degree waters.
When the ocean drops below 57 degrees, scientists say, the turtles begin to freeze.
``In the low 50s, their body temperatures just can't take it and their systems shut down,'' said Frank Hudgins, husbandry curator for the North Carolina Aquarium on Roanoke Island, where two stranded sea turtles are recovering in heated 500-gallon tanks. ``We've had a couple come in dead from hypothermia. We had four total last week, two Saturday and one today. They probably drift just inside the Gulf Stream and then get too cold.''
The Gulf Stream stays about 72 degrees, said Ruth Boettcher, a biologist for the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission who coordinates the state's sea turtle programs. But water around the Gulf Stream has been in the 40s lately off the Outer Banks. Volunteers have rescued turtles from Corolla through Hatteras Island this winter.
``It's a natural phenomenon,'' said Boettcher. ``Turtles can tolerate cold temperatures if they can acclimate to them slowly. But when they're nice and warm, then get out of that current into the cold, they get stunned from the rapid drop. These northeast winds we've been having just keep pushing that Gulf Stream out further.''
People who find stranded sea turtles should not attempt to move them. Because they are federally protected animals, it's against the law to touch one without a permit. Trained volunteers and aquarium employees will pick up and transport turtles if callers notify them about the animals' whereabouts.
Two turtles were living at the North Carolina Aquarium on Monday. Three more were resting at a Kitty Hawk woman's home. Millie Overman, who founded ``Network for Endangered Sea Turtles: N.E.S.T.'' last year, said she's keeping two sea turtles in a plastic kiddie pool and a third one in her bathtub. ``Another turtle spent Christmas in a soft spa that East Coast Soft Spas donated to help save it,'' Overman said.
``We warm them with towels first, and massage their flippers. Then, we put them back in warm water until they can recuperate. We're just running out of room to hold all the ones that've been rescued.''
A Coast Guard crew from Hatteras Inlet has volunteered to take three of the now healthy sea turtles back to the Gulf Stream, this afternoon. Biologists will measure water temperatures to make sure they are warm enough. Then they will release their charges and go back to caring for the ones that are too sick to swim.
``We just want to revive them,'' Hudgins said. ``Then, as soon as they have a good fighting chance, we get them back out into the ocean again.'' MEMO: TO HELP
If you find a stranded sea turtle, don't attempt to touch it. In
Virginia, call the Virginia Marine Science Museum at (804) 425-3474. On
the Outer Banks, call the North Carolina Aquarium at (919) 473-3494 or
Millie Overman at (919) 255-0434.
Overman, who heads the non-profit volunteer group Network for
Endangered Sea Turtles, also needs children's wading pools to turn into
makeshift homes for recuperating sea turtles. The pools must be hard
plastic, at least six feet in diameter, and have no leaks or cracks. If
you can donate a pool on the Outer Banks, call her at 255-0434.
ILLUSTRATION: DREW C. WILSON
The Virginian-Pilot
A Kemp's ridley turtle is rushed by National Park Ranger Paul
Stevens into the caring arms of Bruce Butterworth, with the Network
for Engangered Sea Turtles.
by CNB