Green (Chelonia mydas)
Stranding Location: Isle of Palms, SC
Arrival Date: 2/20/25
Age: Juvenile
Sex: Unknown
Weight: 2.24 kg (4.94 lbs)
Case History
This juvenile green sea turtle was found cold stunned and covered in sand and epibiota on the north end of Isle of Palms, near Dewes Inlet. SCDNR permitted volunteers transported the patient to the Aquarium for treatment.
Treatment
Upon arrival, Dandelion’s internal body temperature was 49 degrees Fahrenheit, and her/his heart rate was 10 bpm (beats per minute). Due to the heavy load of sand and algae on Dandelion’s carapace, we started by cleaning off the upper shell as best we could to obtain a more accurate weight. All of the doses of medications our patients receive are based on their weight, so it is really important to get as accurate a reading as possible at admit. We then took radiographs to assess for any potential pneumonia, which, preliminarily, Dandelion does not appear to have! This, of course, could develop in the next couple of weeks, so we will check again later on.
We also drew a blood sample to send out for further analysis, as this can let us know if patients are fighting off infections or if we need to adjust our treatments at all. In addition, we found that Dandelion had a small ulcer on the right eye that we began to treat with medicated eye drops. Along with those eye drops, Dandelion received fluids with vitamins B and C and calcium to start helping her/him feel better. We dry docked Dandelion overnight in our surgical suite and set the room’s temperature to be a few degrees warmer than Dandelion’s internal temperature. With cold-stunned sea turtles, one of the most important parts of treatment is to warm them up slowly, sometimes over the course of several days. Once Dandelion reaches a temperature closer to 70 degrees F, we will begin administering additional treatments like antibiotics.
Updates
February 25, 2025: Over the next couple of days, Dandelion started to become more active and slowly warmed up. Shortly after admit, we were able to move Dandelion up to a tank in Zucker Family Sea Turtle Recovery™! This deeper water was perfect for Dandelion because of her/his activity, and because we are able to very closely monitor the temperature of these tanks. We dropped the tank’s water temperature to match Dandelion’s internal temperature, and slowly have been increasing it every day until we reach our usual set point. In fact, now that Dandelion has been at least 70 degrees F for a couple of days, we have begun antibiotic treatments and started introducing food items! Come wave hello to Dandelion today!
March 15, 2025: Dandelion has been here for almost a month now and is making small but important strides. We started offering food, but for a while Dandelion was not showing much interest. Dandelion would swim over to food items, but s/he would only nibble a little. We began to wonder if Dandelion was not interested in food because there was muscle weakness or potentially jaw pain. We wanted to get to the bottom of this so Dandelion could begin eating comfortably. Sometimes, muscle weakness can be helped with additional vitamins, so Dandelion was prescribed vitamins and fluids in addition to antibiotics. While this did seem to help a small amount, we still noticed Dandelion hesitating to open her/his mouth very widely. We then decided to try an anti-inflammatory to see if that would do the trick, and it did! Dandelion is now on a weighted diet!