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A South African aquarium is facing an unprecedented challenge as it grapples with an influx of over 500 baby sea turtles, stranded on beaches by a rare and powerful storm. These young turtles, predominantly endangered loggerheads, should be navigating the open ocean, but instead, find themselves in newly constructed plastic tanks at the Turtle Conservation Center at the Two Oceans Aquarium in Cape Town. The center is currently rehabilitating about 400 of the approximately 530 sick and injured turtles, while the remainder are being sent to two other aquariums to relieve the burden.
Typically, baby turtles are left to fend for themselves from the moment they hatch and begin their journey to the sea. In South Africa, loggerheads typically hatch on the northeast coast, far from Cape Town. However, these turtles likely got caught in the warm Indian Ocean Agulhas Current, which carried them around the tip of South Africa and deposited them in the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean near Cape Town. While this journey is not uncommon, the recent powerful storm that struck the Cape Town area is, leaving hundreds of baby turtles in need of assistance.
Normally, the conservation center receives a few to maybe 100 stranded young turtles in the three to four months after hatching season, with a capacity to handle 150 turtles. However, the recent influx of over 500 turtles in just two weeks has overwhelmed their resources, requiring a significant reevaluation of their budget and plans for the year.
Each turtle is expected to cost around $500 to fully rehabilitate before being released into the warmer Indian Ocean in a few months. To cope with the influx, the Turtle Conservation Center has enlisted a large number of volunteers to assist the full-time staff in caring for the turtles, who are ranked based on their level of sickness, with some requiring intensive care due to injuries, malnutrition, or infection. Each turtle is marked with a number on its shell for identification purposes.
While the storm was a severe shock to the turtles, highlighting their vulnerability to extreme weather and climate change, it also revealed another increasingly common danger. Many of the turtles had ingested small pieces of plastic, which were expelled from their systems after they arrived at the aquarium. This unexpected discovery has provided valuable insight into the impact of plastic pollution on marine life, with the conservation team noting a significant amount of plastic pieces, some as large as a fingernail, collected in just one day.
Sea turtles spend most of their lives in the ocean, except for when they are born and when females return to shore to lay eggs. This makes them important "ocean indicators," according to Talitha Noble-Trull, head of the Turtle Conservation Center. She emphasizes the importance of collecting data on plastic pollution, as the turtles are not merely suggesting but vehemently showing that the oceans are becoming increasingly unsafe for them.