Turtles released from Coast could provide answers if Bonnet Carré is opened in 2020
Two young sea turtles rehabilitated, tagged and released into the Mississippi Sound have wasted no time heading for warmer waters, logging a combined 113 miles in less than nine days.
The loggerhead and endangered Kemp’s ridley turtles headed south in a hurry to the Breton Sound off the southeastern shores of Louisiana.
Their trek shows the connection between the estuaries of Mississippi and Louisiana and how projects in one state affect the other, said Moby Solangi, executive director of the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Gulfport. IMMS nursed the ailing turtles back to health.
The turtles’ progress is being tracked by satellite in the wake of the Bonnet Carré Spillway’s longest opening in history — 143 days that created fisheries disasters in both south Louisiana and Mississippi. Trillions of gallons of Mississippi River water poured through the spillway into Lake Ponchartrain and the salty estuaries beyond, killing oysters, turtles and dolphins and displacing other aquatic life.
While salinity levels the animals need to thrive have returned to normal since the spillway closed, another opening looms for 2020 with predictions of more flooding on the Mississippi. The Breton and Mississippi sounds are threatened with even more river water from planned permanent diversions that the state of Louisiana believes will build land along its shrinking coastline.
South Mississippi is mobilizing to better understand those diversions and secure a voice in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ flood-control decisions.
The turtles could provide some answers.
A fisherman found the lethargic loggerhead in May floating off Horn Island. Mississippi State veterinarians treated the turtle for pneumonia. She was nursed back to health at IMMS and named Fig Newton along the way. A fisherman in Waveland snagged the Kemp’s ridley on a hook and line in September. The hook was removed and the turtle, named Scar, was fed a soft diet until it recovered.
Solangi wonders what will happen to the turtles if the Bonnet Carré opens for any prolonged period. Loggerheads have a wider range than Kemp’s ridleys. The Mississippi Sound is a nursery for Kemp’s ridley turtles, the most endangered in the world. They reproduce in Mexico and live as adults in deeper Gulf waters.
“These turtles did not stop one minute,” Solangi told the Sun Herald on Tueday. “They know where they need to be this time of year. These animals have a God-given capability to know where they needed to go. They went where they should be in the wintertime and, hopefully, they’ll be back in the spring.”
As a member of the Turtle Stranding and Salvage Network, IMMS responds to turtle strandings in this region. The nonprofit organization has tagged a total of 56 Kemp’s ridley, 2 loggerheads and one green turtle. The batteries on satellite tags usually last six to nine months.
Dolphin and sea turtle strandings can be reported by calling 888-767-3657. IMMS responds around the clock.
