Topsail Beach, NC - The Karen Beasley Sea Turtle Rescue and Rehabilitation Center

Sea Turtle Hospital News

It’s well known that we go to extraordinary efforts to save every turtle that comes through our doors. But even though we don’t always need our super powers, every once in a while we throw everything and everyone we’ve got at a turtle to get him back home.

For over a year a juvenile loggerhead named "Boater" has been the focus of some very intensive treatment and support. Boater had been severely injured by a boat, with extremely deep lacerations to his head and carapace. On September 15, 2007 a concerned commercial fisherman spotted him in Core Sound, and after plucking him out of the water he delivered him to wildlife officials. A battered Boater arrived at our hospital on the 16th and was immediately treated for pain and infection. On the 18th he had the first of what would be several surgeries at the NC State Vet School. After cleaning his wounds and literally screwing him back together with stainless steel plates, Boater was returned to our care. This severely damaged turtle then spent several months in what must be turtle hell - dry-docked - to keep water and debris out of his wounds. He was cleaned and flushed and medicated twice a day, and the only time he saw more than a few inches of water was when he was fed.

By November we began to see some improvement, but to be on the safe side Boater was transported back to the vet school for a tune-up. His wounds were checked and debrided, and the plates were removed and reset to further reduce the size of the openings. One of the factors important to his recovery was that he was always looking for his next meal, and we served him all the fish and squid he could eat several times a day to help him rebuild his strength.

Now even though things looked good on the outside we know from experience that wounds as deep as Boater’s have a tendency to close up and trap "stuff" inside. A few months ago Boater became a fussy eater. He was listless, and just didn’t look right to us. On October 14th he was back at the vet school for some exploratory surgery. Sure enough, in spite of an intensive treatment protocol and our best efforts "stuff" had become trapped and infected deep inside one of his wounds.

Poor Boater: for the next month he was back to being dry-docked, flushed and medicated twice a day. And he was not happy about it; refusing to eat at first, and later insisting that the only thing he didn’t turn his nose up at (shrimp) be dropped directly into his mouth. We did everything but butterfly and pre-chew it for him!

Although still far from that ride to the beach, he’s back in water and he patiently (sort of) endures about an hour of treatment every afternoon. Recently we’ve added a growth hormone to his list of medications in the effort to regenerate nerves and tissue that were all but destroyed by his injury. He’s slowly increasing his activity level, and remains a bit of a fussy eater, but we’re happy to report that our Boat(er) is once again floating.

A Very Special Thank You
To George Howard at On Shore Surf Shop. As the cold-stuns and injured turtles continued to arrive we were forced to set up whatever tanks were handy at the moment. That meant several of our turtles; Lola, Dixon, and February, were squeezed into tanks so small that they were spinning in circles most of the time. That’s when George stepped in to repair three of our larger fiberglass tanks, gratis. So thanks to George these three ladies (or guys, or some of each) are now in much larger and brighter homes. Once we relocated them to their new tanks we were finally able to plumb them into the system, so now they’re getting a constant flow of filtered and warm water. Believe me when I say these are three very happy turtles. I swear February smiles at us now. So from the turtles, and from the volunteers whose workload has lightened considerably, big giant, scaly flipper hugs to George Howard!

Questions, comments or suggestions for stories
Contact me at: flippers@embarqmail.com.  This column will appear approximately every two weeks during the winter months.