Sima gets her flipper tags.

Tuesday was the last hurdle for each turtle – pre-release physicals. Twenty-two of our twenty-seven turtles were asked to donate blood and to publicly weigh in. When it comes to size, the bigger the better for recovered sea turtles. These critters don’t look all that big when they’re swimming around in their tank. But when you’re sitting next them – Wow! – must be something in the food! Now when you’re too big, well, “Cora” broke our scale.

Our tiny facility was filled with almost as many people as patients. By separating into three groups, we were able to get through the day with a minimum of bruising, at least from human contact. Most of our cuts, scrapes and bruises came from flying flippers and sea turtles that were channeling their snapper cousins.

Our “turtle wranglers” were staged out front, where they snacked on cookies while regaining their strength in-between patients. Inside, volunteers were busy draining tanks and assisting our vet, Dr. Harms, and his crew.

Out back was the nursery, complete with scale and smaller needles. All of our babies had been relocated to outside tanks under tarps in what looked like a MASH unit. Flitting in and out as each turtle was dry-docked were our former intern and current State Sea Turtle Biologist Wendy Cluse and her comrade Michael Coyne, armed with calipers, tape measure, tags and camera.

As blood work was completed and the final stats were read, we either cheered of sighed, but mostly cheered. We already knew that Boater, Eight, Snow, Carter and Lennie were not going, but were surprised when our healthy-looking Swan’s blood did not measure up to par. Little greens on the “possible” list who will be spending more time with us include Macon, Leap and Shackleford. We let Miss Jean break the bad news to them, but the up side is they’ll be moving into much larger tanks, and some of them will join Ambassador Lennie on our open house tour this summer. We’ll enjoy spending another few weeks spoiling our parolees, fattening them up even more before returning them to Mother Ocean.

Turtle Talks Begin May 28th

Lilmar’s popular weekly turtle talks will resume on Wednesday, May 28th and continue every Wednesday through Labor Day. This one-hour presentation, 3:45 – 4:45 PM will include oodles of hands-on materials to introduce you to the mysterious world of sea turtles. There’ll be visuals and handouts appropriate for ages K-adult, and plenty of cool photo ops, so bring your camera. The site is the Surf City Community Center, JH Batts Rd. (off Rt. 210 between Docksider and Gilligans.) Admission is free but donations for our turtles are appreciated. Please leave food and drinks in the car.

For more information call the hospital at: 910-328-3377.

(Right) - Kemp's Ridley "Sima" gets her barcode tag (yes, she beeps!)

Buy a ticket, feed a turtle, and maybe win a Suzuki

This is our fourth year as one of the Wilmington area non-profit groups selected to take part in the Bruce Cavenaugh Suzuki Charity Raffle. A $20 ticket buys a chance to win one of two 2008 Suzukis: a Grand Vitara or an SX4. Bruce even pays the sales tax, license, title and registration fees, along with any other normal new car fees.

All you have to do is pick up your Suzuki on June 25th and drive it home. The best thing about this event, other than winning a car, is that 100% of the money from the tickets you buy from us will go back to the hospital.  Even if you don’t win the car, the purchase price is considered a charitable deduction.

Tickets sold by the Turtle Hospital are currently available through June 6th, at the Topsail Chamber of Commerce on the causeway. Any hospital volunteer you know will gladly get you tickets. We will also be selling tickets at the Sneads Ferry Food Lion beginning at 10 AM on May 31st and June 1st. 

Tracking tracks

C’mon ladies – we’re ready for you. As of this writing no confirmed nests, but we have had several false crawls. Apparently, those mamas didn’t like what they found or were scared off by too much activity or bright lights. At least we know the girls are interested and shopping for the best spot.

Please report all sea turtle activity (nestings, strandings, injured turtles or hatchings) to our Director of Beach Operations, Terry Meyer @ 910-470-2880.

Hospital closed until June

We know you want to see our turtles up close, but until we can get some of the kids back to the surf, rework our tanks and shuffle the remaining patients around you’ll have to be content to wave at them through our garage door windows. You can wave at us, too.

Until then visit us on-line at: www.seaturtlehospital.org.

Questions, comments or suggestions for stories

Contact me at: flippers@embarqmail.com.

All photos submitted by Karen Sota

editor@topsail-publishing.com