Today we go to a hospital! Don't worry mom, nobody got hurt. But we are going to visit some sick sea turtles! This is a very special hospital in the Florida Keys. They take care of turtles that are sick. Thy have a website http://www.turtlehospital.org/
Look, they even have a turtle ambulance!
We go to the visitor center first.
We read some information about sea turtles.
These are the shells of the different species of sea turtles. They are very large animals!!
We watch a slide show telling us more about sea turtles and why they end up at the hospital.
This is the emergency room. The lady is using a toy to show us what they do when a turtle is delivered to an emergency room. Did you know that turtles are conscious breathers? That means that while they are under anaesthesia an assistant has to stand by and pump oxygen into the turtle's lung at regular intervals so it won't suffocate.
They have equipment to take digital X Rays of the patients. Digital is useful because the doctors are volunteers so they are not at the hospital all the time. Now they can view the digital image from where they are and give diagnosis quickly. These x rays show that the turtle has a fishing hook in the stomach! Ouch, that must really hurt.
Next we walk over to visit the patients. First we go to the ICU where each patient has his own room, er, pool.
We meet Kentucky. She has been biten by a shark but is lucky enough to live to tell the tale! (you can read more of her story at http://www.turtlehospital.org/blog/?m=201004)
Here you can see clearly the shark bites on her shell. She is so excited to see us, I guess she never tires of retelling her adventure!
This turtle suffers the bubble butt syndrome. This happens when a motor boat hits the turtle so hard that the shell is misshapened. An air bubble forms inside the shell. This is a problem as the turtle can no longer sink below water, meaning that he cannot find food or shelter from predators. The doctors have not found a cure yet, but they put a weight on the shell so the turtle can sink below the surface. However, as the turtle grow, the old plates on the shell fall off, so the weight is not a permanent solution. The turtles will thus have to spend the rest of their lives in the sanctuary.
Here is another turtle recuperating. You can see that on her flippers there are some scars. She has tumor but it has been removed.
This is Romeo. He's a baby but sadly has lost a flipper already!!
This is Joe. He was born without one flipper then got another one bitten off by a predator. But we are told that Joe seems to swim around pretty well with just two flippers so they may release him into the wild.
Isn't he a beautiful turtle?
Besides the individual Intensive Care Units, there are two big pools. It used to be a swimming pool of a hotel. The pool gets water from the sea outside. Here lives the turtles who are soon to be released back to the wild as well as those permanent residents.
Here you can see the weight attached to the turtle's back to keep him from floating all the time.
We are given some pellets to feed the turtles. My host cannot manage holding the feed and us and the camera (she needs another flipper -- I mean hand) so there is no picture. She says she doesn't want to feed us to the turtles by mistake.
I am really glad to vist the hospital. It's nice knowing that the injured turtles are well cared for. We hope that all the sea turtles will recover soon. We also hope that humans will stop throwing garbage into the sea, respect slow boat zone, so that the turtles will have a easier life.
We save the band for souvenir.
Afterwards we have lunch. We sit outside so we can enjoy the breeze and the view.
We have a fish rueben and a basket of fish and chips. Delicious!!
