The animal care staff are seeing many problems with the turtles as a result of the cold weather. Turtles, like other reptiles, are cold-blooded animals and rely on the environment to control their body temperature. As the sea turtles spend more time in the cold waters that are hitting Florida, they can become stunned, tired and weak, causing the mass beaching currently under way.

Veterinarians, technicians and volunteers from all over Florida and beyond are converging on the rehab center to assist with this great effort to save these turtles. They are using state of the art laser surgery to treat wart like tumors called fibropapilloma that are thought to be caused by viral infections. These tumors can be found both internally and externally on the turtles. When the tumors grow in size, they can interfere with basic function of flippers, eyes and mouths of the turtles, preventing the turtles from swimming, seeing or eating normally.

People from up and down the coast are finding beached sea turtles and bringing them to rehabilitation centers by the truck load. Vet staff at the centers could not handle the amount of patients and asked zoos and aquariums from around the country to send skilled vet techs to assist.  That’s where Abbey comes in…

Here is a blog entry from Abbey:

There is so much I wish I could do for the turtles but they don't have sufficient capabilities or supplies here. No x-rays, no autoclave, no surgical suite. Seems like they need to treat what they can and transfer or release what's left. They are hoping to get their numbers (currently in the 50's) down to the originally planned population of seven. The question is where to transfer the turtles. Every facility on the east coast is full, so they may be released as is. Some problems, like injured flipper tips could be fixed with x-rays and surgery to remove the lytic bones. But they also need to time to heal, and that can't happen overnight.

We had a new turtle come in this morning that appeared dead, but perked up by the end of the day and was swimming with the others. The afternoon was spent gathering medications, feeding and monitoring the turtles, and setting up what little we have for surgery tomorrow. 

One of the photos in this post shows a turtle with bilateral broken flipper tips and abscesses on the plastron. She is smaller than my laptop keyboard. Another photo details the many paps that cover these turtles. Many turtles have necrotic paps that need betadine debridement, and many have them covering their eyes, affecting their vision. Some turtles have larger paps on their bodies that they affect their swimming.

Check back for another soon.

Posted by Abbey Grobe, animal health

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