Photo: Courtesy of International Fund for Animal Welfare
PROVINCETOWN, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio)— Three local animal organizations helped save a 600-pound Sea Turtle on Sunday after it was stranded in Cape Cod.
The Mass Audubon Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary, the International Fund for Animal Welfare, and the New England Aquarium all teamed up over the weekend to rescue the five-foot-long leatherback sea turtle that stranded itself along Herring River in Wellfleet.
The sea turtle was relocated from Wellfleet to Provincetown where staff from the New England Aquarium performed a health check-up. The staff took a blood sample to analyze the sea turtle's health before giving it vitamins and some medicine.
“Our initial evaluation indicated that the turtle was very strong and in good body condition, and this helped us to decide that it was a good candidate for release,” Dr. Charles Innis, director of animal health at the New England Aquarium, said in a statement.
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During their examination, staff fitted the turtle with an identification tag and a satellite tracking tag. The aquarium plans to use the satellite tag to make sure the sea turtle survives for the next 30 days.
They also gave the turtle an acoustic tag that will help them monitor its migration patterns for the next five to 10 years.
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