When temperatures in Texas dropped, it was affecting not only humans but also wildlife. Thousands of stunned sea turtles were rescued by wildlife volunteers as they were washed up on the Gulf Coast.
Some of them were loading the stunned sea turtles at the back of their Subaru, and others laid the turtles in row after row on the deck of a ship.
Wildlife groups and volunteers have been rescuing these stunned sea turtles for days. They have shared photos online to show turtles hauled from frigid waters suffering from Texas's frigid temperature.
Turtles are getting cold-stunned when exposed for too long to cold water temperatures below 50 degrees Fahrenheit. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, stunned sea turtles could "become lethargic and are eventually unable to swim, causing them to float at the surface."
Rescuing Thousands of Stunned Sea Turtles
Every year, sea turtles are rescued from cold snaps. However, this year is different as thousands of them are rescued. The major drop in temperatures in Texas this year spelled trouble for these sea turtles.
The Texas Fish and Wildlife reported over 2,000 stunned sea turtles due to the cold temperature of the Texan coast's waters.
HuffPost reported that failure to return the sea turtles to warmer waters would soon kill them. A nonprofit organization on the South Padre Island in Texas, Sea Turtle, Inc., had already rescued thousands of sea turtles that are cold-stunned this year.
Due to the number of rescued sea turtles, Sea Turtle, Inc. had to use South Padre Island's convention center to help them nurse the sea turtles back to health.
Sea Turtle Inc.'s executive director, Wendy Knight, said that this year's rescue is the largest stun-cold event in over a decade. But the conditions were dire for the turtles as the building they were in also lost electric power like most Texan households after a storm nearly caused the collapse of the power grid.
"All of these efforts will be in vain if we do not soon get power restored," Knight said in a video on Facebook. "We need our power back on."
My mom is retired, & she spends her winters volunteering at a sea turtle rescue center in south Texas. The cold snap is stunning the local turtles & they’re doing a lot of rescues. She sent me this photo today of the back of her Subaru. It’s *literally* turtles all the way down. pic.twitter.com/xaDRNjLDoQ
— Lara (@lara__mac) February 15, 2021
Texas Game Wardens assigned to Cameron county rescued 141 sea turtles from the frigid waters of the Brownsville Ship Channel and surrounding bays. The sea turtles were transported via the PV Murchison, operated by Sgt. Game Warden Duke and B/M Bowers-Vest. pic.twitter.com/LqFBrElTog
— Texas Game Warden (@TexasGameWarden) February 17, 2021
Inability to Regulate Internal Body Temperature
Turtles are reptiles, which means they are cold-blooded who cannot regulate their internal body temperature. For example, when temperatures of the environment get cold, these animals also get cold.
According to ACS, cold-blooded animals get their heat from the outside environment, making their body temperature fluctuate based on their external environment.
For instance, their body temperature will also drop if it is 50 °F outside. The same principle applies when it is 100 °F outside. Most of the animal kingdom, except for birds, are cold-blooded.
That is what happened to the cold-stunned sea turtles rescued in Texas, Gizmodo reported. The sea turtles were not able to cope up and became hypothermic. They stopped swimming and floated on the surface.
Cold-stunned sea turtles are like this, and they become vulnerable to predators or boats and are often rescued by humans and given a place to warm up.
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