Posts Tagged ‘Provincetown’

First Cold-Stunned Sea Turtle of 2008 Rescued

Friday, October 24th, 2008

The Cape Cod Times, “Kemp’s Ridley Turtle Found Stranded,” reports this morning, “The first cold-stunned Kemp’s ridley [sea] turtle of the stranding season was rescued in local waters yesterday [October 23rd], according to the Massachusetts Audubon Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary.”  Bob Prescott, director of the sanctuary, noted that the turtle weighed about 8 pounds and was estimated at around four years old.  It had an old boat propellor injury on its left front flipper that may have weakened the turtle and predisposed this animal to early cold-stunned stranding.

Cold-Stunned Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle (File Photograph)

Cold-stunned strandings of endangered sea turtles occur each fall in Cape Cod Bay.  These juvenile reptiles, usually two to five years old, become trapped by walls of cold ocean water within the warmer hook of Cape Cod during normal southward migration as temperatures drop early each fall.  When bay water plunges to around 50F, these turtles become cold-stunned, enter a stupor-like state and are tossed on the beach by sustained winds.

The earliest standed turtles, usually found in late October or early November, have the smallest mass, weighing in at five pounds or less.  As the season progresses, larger and larger animals succumb to cold-stunning and are tossed by autumn storms onto the beach.  Species include Kemp’s ridleys, green sea turtles and loggerheads, which are the more massive and usually the last ones to strand.  Occasionally, a hybrid or a hawksbill has been known to strand on Cape Cod beaches.  All strandings, with only an exception or two to prove the rule, occur on bayside beaches from Provincetown to Sandwich, with the greatest numbers found between Truro and Dennis.

Yesterday afternoon’s turtle was discoverd by beach walkers on Sandy Neck beach in Barnstable, brought to the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary for stabilization, and then transported to New England Aquarium for medical treatment and rehabilitation.

Two-Year-Old Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle Rescued from Chapin Beach, Dennis

You may recall that the Turtle Journal team rescued a small, pre-stunned Kemp’s Ridley at nearby Chapin Beach in Dennis on September 5th (see Saving a Critically Endangered Sea Turtle).

What to Do if You Find a Sea Turtle

Sea turtles are federally protected and cannot be legally handled without an appropriate license.  If you see a sea turtle in distress on the beach, NEVER return it to the water.  Move it above the high water mark, cover it with dry seaweed to prevent additional hypothermia, mark the spot with some gaudy flotsam and call Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary at 508-349-2615 as soon as possible.  If your call comes “after hours,” you may leave a message on the sanctuary line or you can call the 24/7 turtle hot line at 508-274-5108 any time of the day or night.  The Turtle Journal team will answer your call and respond immediately to rescue the animal.

Sad Tale of Three Dead Leatherback Sea Turtles

Monday, September 8th, 2008

Leviathans of the sea and giants of the reptile family, leatherback sea turtles define the term superlative.  Ranging in weight up to a ton and the size of a small Volkswagen, no one who has encountered one of these living relics in the wild comes away from the experience unchanged.  They are simply magnificent beasts that peacefully ply the world’s oceans in search of slurpy jellyfish.  The open mouth of a leatherback sea turtle (see below) is perfectly configured for this quest and is the last thing that a jellyfish senses before the lights go out.

Mouth of 650+ Pound Male Leatherback Sea Turtle

Unfortunately, we humans offer them a complex series of lethal obstacles to avoid during their peaceful voyages.  Gill nets drown them, longlines hook them, propellers slice them, weirs trap them and lobster buoys entangle them.  Especially during the summer months in Cape Cod and Buzzards Bays as they chase plentiful jellyfish, endangered leatherbacks face a host of potential threats.

Male Leatherback Arrives at Wellfleet Sanctuary for Necropsy

A freshly dead 650+ pound male leatherback beached in Provincetown on Sunday and Mass Audubon’s Bob Prescott, the state sea turtle stranding coordinator, conducted a necropsy at the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary to determine the cause of death and to gather scientific information to help us conserve this endangered species.  In addition to his staff, Bob (with large caliper below) was assisted by Kara Dodge, a PhD candidate at UNH and former NOAA sea turtle coordinator, and the Turtle Journal team.

Bob Prescott (Calipers), Don Lewis (Camera) and Kara Dodge (Scalpel)

Too large for normal scales, the mass of leatherbacks is determined by weighing the Mass Audubon pickup truck at the dump with the turtle inside, and then re-weighing the truck without the turtle.  The post revealed that this animal had been very healthy.  “It had everything going for it,” stated Bob and Kara.  Both flippers showed signs of a recent entanglement, but nothing so severe that these wounds would have caused death.  Instead, the cause of death was determined to be drowning.  The likely scenario for the death of such an inherently healthy animal is that it got entangled in a buoy line with both flippers wrapped in the rope and perhaps its body trunk as well.  With the last series of spring tides, the turtle may not have had sufficient line to reach the surface.  Like all turtles, leatherbacks are air breathers and will drown if held under water for a sustained period.  How this drowned animal had then become disentangled from the lines that had been wrapped tightly around its flippers is merely a matter of conjecture.

This evening we received a call from Bob Prescott that there had been a report of a dead leatherback on a Westport beach near Horseneck.  We drove out to the site and after about 30 minutes of searching, we discovered a badly decomposed and deflated leatherback sea turtle.  Talking to a local resident, we learned it had been bouncing along the beach for at least the last three days.  We estimated the carapace at approximately 161.3 centimeters, but decomposition and deflation may have altered any accurate rendering of its precise size.  Bones were exposed throughout from head to back to flippers.

Decomposed Leatherback Sea Turtle in Wesport, MA

Another decomposed, 600 pound leatherback washed ashore at Pico Beach in Mattapoisett Saturday night (http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080909/NEWS/809090352/-1/NEWS).  Dealing with one dead leatherback is serious as population numbers of this critically endangered species continue to plummet.  Finding two dead leatherback carcasses in a weekend is a tragedy; but three dead leatherbacks fall beyond emotions and words.  Yet, a ray of turtle hope winked through the afternoon when a call came into the Hotline.  A woman found a small 1/2 dollar size turtle in Plymouth, Massachusetts as kids were placing it in the ocean and the animal was being forced back to the shore by wave action and its own volition.  She thought she had discovered a baby sea turtle, or perhaps a diamondback terrapin hatchling.  A few questions cleared up the mystery.  Color?  Dark, almost black.  Long tail?  Yes, very long.  Bump along the tail?  Yes, like an ancient dinosaur.  Jagged edge along rear of carapace (top shell)?  Yep.  Does it have a yellow “button” in the middle of its tummy?  Yes.  Congratulations!  You are the proud holder of a snapping turtle hatchling.  With just a few more questions we discovered the local fresh water source from whence the hatchling probably came, either through its own design or more likely with the help of local kids.

Snapping Turtle Hatchling

You’re right.  Snapping turtles aren’t endangered and they’re not leatherbacks.  But that doesn’t diminish the joy in helping a hatchling find hospitable habitat where it might have a fighting chance of survival.  Saving one turtle … even a snapper … isn’t a bad way to close the day.