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January 22, 2001

Sea turtles returned to ocean after joint rehabilitation effort

Two loggerhead sea turtles that were picked up last summer off the coast of South Carolina were returned to the wild recently after months of collaborative rehabilitation from the S.C. Department of Natural Resources and South Carolina Aquarium.

John Coker, S.C. Department of Natural Resources (DNR) wildlife technician, drove the turtles down to Sebastian Inlet, which is below Melbourne Beach, Fla., where the water temperatures are warm enough to release them close to shore.

According to Coker, both turtles were quite active on their trip down, and seemed anxious to get out of their confining quarters in the van. Once at the beach, Coker was met by Dr. Blair Witherington, a sea turtle scientist in Melbourne with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (the state wildlife agency). The crew picked up each of the turtles and walked them about 500 yards down the beach to the water.

"I would describe the release as being everything we could ask for," Coker said. "The turtles didn’t put up a fight at all, and it was a beautifully sunny afternoon and the water was clear blue. They had a great place to be released."

The turtles were released into the surf about a half-mile south of Sebastian Inlet with the help of Witherington and his group of four volunteers. The male was put in the water about 5 p.m. "He paused at first, then it looked as if he were going to try to swim north, back up toward Charleston," Coker said. "But he soon turned and swam out through the surf and disappeared into the ocean. When we put the female she didn’t hesitate at all - she swam straight out into the ocean."

About a dozen people who had been walking on the beach gathered to watch the event. The turtles were released on Archie Carr Park property, part of a national wildlife refuge. Carr, who is deceased, was a pioneer in sea turtle research and was a professor at the University of Florida.

The two loggerheads were found separately last summer in Beaufort County, one in Port Royal Sound, and the other in Trenchards Inlet. The first turtle discovered, a 94-pound male, was found by a DNR law enforcement officer. The DNR transported the turtle to Sea Islands Veterinary Hospital for radiographs.

A week after the male loggerhead appeared, Amber Von Harten, Pritchards Island sea turtle coordinator, received a call from concerned shrimpers on board the commercial shrimp trawler "Tiderunner." The shrimp trawler crew did their best to keep the 85-pound female turtle comfortable, and even brought it onto the boat and covered it with a wet towel.

Charlotte Hope, DNR biologist, kept the turtles in an outside tank at the DNR’s property at Donnelley

Wildlife Management Area in Green Pond. Hope did immediate first aid on the turtles, then spent the next week on the phone trying to find out where to place them. "On behalf of the DNR, I want to stress how much we appreciate the efforts of the South Carolina Aquarium. They agreed to take the first turtle into their animal holding facility, and they really had to make room for the second one," Hope said. "The night temperatures in the outdoor tank at Donnelley WMA were getting too cold for them to heal, and eventually it would have been lethal for them to be in below 50 degree water."
           
Before now, there was no such facility in South Carolina to do long-term rehabilitation. "We’ve had to take turtles up to the National Aquarium in Baltimore and down to Sea World in Orlando," Hope said. "When all of our regular options were full, the South Carolina Aquarium stepped up to take in these two turtles that were very sick. It’s very important to have places in South Carolina to do this because it can take months to rehabilitate these animals."

The turtles were labeled as "floaters" because they were unable to dive underwater. If left in the wild, they would have been unable to eat and eventually would have died. Laparoscopy is a method that hasn’t been done before now to determine why turtles become floaters. Usually floaters are just kept in holding tanks, where they are fed until their problem self-heals. But with these two turtles, Dr. Dave Owens of the University of Charleston Grice Marine Lab did laparoscopy to discover what was making them float. A team of veterinarians, Al Segars of the DNR and Tom Sheridan of the Aquarium, assisted in the procedure. "The laparoscopy method worked instantly - right when it was done the turtles were able to dive back under water," Hope said. "Metabolic gas caused by infection caused the floating problem."

The South Carolina Aquarium considers the release "a significant milestone," as this was the first release of rehabilitated animals since the Aquarium opened in May 2000. "Currently we don’t have a formal program in place for rehabilitating stranded animals, and can only assist under emergency situations. But this successful release has encouraged us to consider a more structured program for the future," stated Bruce Hecker, South Carolina Aquarium director of husbandry and facilities. "We salute the Department of Natural Resources for its ongoing recovery efforts and hope to partner more in the future with them and other environmental groups to preserve and restore our native animals and environments. The loggerhead rehabilitation effort is just one example of things to come in future years at our institution."
           
The DNR assists in every way it can when it comes to injured turtles, but because of limited space can currently only take in turtles that are in an emergency situation.

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