The Vancouver Aquarium is helping to send four of its veterinary technicians to Louisiana to help with the care of turtles injured in the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
The first, Chelsea DeColle, spent two weeks in New Orleans in August volunteering medical care with the non-profit Audubon Nature Institute.
“It was a once in a lifetime opportunity,” DeColle said. “Unfortunate that it had to be a once in a lifetime opportunity because of the spill, but it was a great hands-on experience.”
She helped feed and monitor 167 turtles (and one bottlenose dolphin) that were suffering from anemia, infections, even wounds from shark attacks.
Most of the animals were healthy, she said, and were in “maintenance mode,” being fed, and weighed until it was deemed safe to return them to the sea. While she was there, from Aug. 18 to 30, more than two-dozen turtles were released and no other oiled turtles had been taken in.
