CM-WPT-12-01-17-01 “Will” Green Turtle arrived 1/17/12 7.65 lbs
CM-JMG-12-01-06-01 “Autumn” Green Turtle arrived 1/6/12 5.5 lbs
WILL
3/7/12 Yesterday late Matthew Godfrey** notified aquarist Kristin Clark that a charter boat captain would be leaving from Hatteras at 5:30 a.m. this morning and was offering to release sea turtles into the Gulf Stream. He is the same captain who gave our Jason #1, Romano, and little baby Buster a ride out to the Gulf Stream from Morehead City 1/31/12. This time he was taking 2 loggerheads from further south and our little greens.
2/24/12 Will and Autumn were weighed and had blood drawn with these results:
WILL PCV 27%** Wt 7.92 lb. gain of 0.27 lb.
AUTUMN PCV 33% (1/18/12= 23%) Wt 6.16 lb. gain of 0.56 lb.
This was not a great surprise. Autumn had been eating as much as we would give her for some time, catching the chunks of fish as they would fall thru the water…a joy to watch eat. Will had been eating quite well off the bottom of the tank. Based on NO scientific fact, I tend to refer to Autumn as having ADD…always busy peeping thru the lattice separating the two of them in the large tank and trying to stick her nose thru, especially if we fed Will first. She would also often swim kind of vertically, head bobbing out of the water looking around. New for me to see and fun to watch.
Tonight they both are swimming in the Gulf Stream, healthy and free.
*The hematocrit (Ht or HCT) or packed cell volume (PCV) or erythrocyte volume fraction (EVF) is the percentage of concentration of red blood cells in blood.
WILL
**Dr. Matthew Godfrey is coordinator of the NC State Sea Turtle Project