Meet the non-oiled sea turtles

June 16, 2010 | Tag(s): LMMSTRP, margeaux, oil spill, rescue, sea turtles, treme

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Not all sea turtles that have come into our care recently have been oil affected. This medium size female Kemp’s Ridley was brought to us last week from the Lake Charles area by our partners, Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF). LDWF was performing routine sampling operations using a giant net, when, lo and behold, they netted a sea turtle.

Now, LDWF could tell that this was just your average sea turtle, minding its own business, which happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. There was no visible oiling.

“If there was no oil why was she brought to Audubon?” Well, every stranded animal has to be treated as an oiled ‘suspect.’ That’s why she was brought to Audubon Nature Institute and to the care of Audubon Aquarium staff.

We currently have four sea turtles that are non-oil affected in our care, two of which came in before the very first oiled sea turtle. Since all were stranded during the oil spill window of time, the turtles had to receive work-ups to those of the oiled turtles.

Louisiana Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle Rescue Program (LMMSTRP) has been in the sea turtle and marine mammal rescue and rehabilitation business for the past 15 years. LMMSTRP is coordinated by Audubon Aquarium in partnership with NOAA and LDWF. If you would like to see some rescued sea turtles, you may want to venture on down to Audubon Aquarium and meet Treme and Margeaux.

Treme and Margeaux are two female Green sea turtles that were rescued in December of 2009 due to being cold stunned. They underwent rehabilitation at Audubon Aquarium and are now on display in their ‘vacation home’ while they wait for release back to their natural habitat. You can find Margeaux in the Caribbean Tunnel and Treme is in the Flower Garden Banks display.

For the latest numbers of animals affected by the oil spill, please visit the Deepwater Horizon Response site.

To learn more about how you can help, please visit our oil spill resource page. It contains a wealth of information, everything from adopting animals to numbers to call to all about LMMSTRP.

What will tomorrow hold? We never know but we are ready for anything and everything. Until then:

"For in the end, we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand. We will understand only what we are taught."~Baba Dioum