'Flying' Sea Turtles Flee the Cold for Florida's Balmy Shores

Watch the video at the bottom of this post.

When those New England temperatures dip and snow begins to fall in feet instead of inches, it’s not just people who find themselves in danger from the elements.

It seems sea turtles, too, can suffer the perils of a brutally cold winter. That’s been the case this winter as hundreds of endangered sea turtles found themselves on the wrong side of their territory map as temperatures plummeted.

“So many sea turtles were rescued from dangerously cold New England waters over the last few months that some had to be flown to rehabilitation facilities here in Florida,” the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission explained on its YouTube page.

Those turtles, mostly endangered Kemp’s Ridley turtles, began arriving by air courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard flights in November. The critters were bound for rehabilitation facilities all over the state, including The Florida Aquarium in Tampa and Gulf World Marine Park in Panama City Beach. In all, three flights were needed to transport all the rescued critters, FWC noted.

The cold-stunned critters were airlifted to the Sunshine State and transferred into the care of local rescue organizations. Those organizations, in turn, helped nurse the creatures back to health with an eye toward releasing them into Florida’s warmer, more turtle-friendly waters.

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While most of the turtles required just a little care to warm their bodies before release, some have been feeling the effects of pneumonia and remain under a watchful medical eye.

The idea is to “gradually increase their body temperature,” explained Stephanie Nagle, the education coordinator for Gulf World Marine Park. “Most of the time we want to make that turnaround fast.”

The Panama City Beach facility received about 50 sea turtles in late November and another 23 turtles Dec. 15. Right now, they have nine left in their care Nagle said. Once those nine are medically cleared, they’ll return to the water.

Kemp’s Ridley sea turtles, considered the smallest marine turtles in the world, have a range that covers the entire eastern seaboard and the Gulf of Mexico. Since these turtles “migrate constantly,” it’s not uncommon for them to get stuck in a bad area when temperatures fall, Secret Holmes-Douglas, the marine park’s director, said.

Agencies like Gulf World are happy to step in and help the critters get back on their feet, Holmes-Douglas explained. Fundraising efforts of such nonprofit institutes help offset the costs of care and release, she noted.

Other agencies that participated in the rescue include Disney’s Living Seas, the Miami Seaquarium, the Turtle Hospital in Marathon, SeaWorld of Florida, Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton and Loggerhead Marinelife Center, according to FWC.

A large batch of the rescued turtles was released Tuesday into the warm waters off St. George Island.

Photos courtesy of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission