2/16/10

#73: Exams during school vacation? If you're a sea turtle!

It's February school vacation here in Massachusetts. It's always an exciting time to visit the Aquarium but we decided to make it even more special this year. We thought visitors might like to see how we care for our animals so we scheduled sea turtle exams this week. First up, our two Kemp's ridley sea turtles, Scute and Ari.

We started by swimming both sea turtles into our turtle removal box.



Then we attached the box to the crane so it could be lifted out of the water.



Our Animal Health Department checked their eyes, nostrils, and mouths...



...and performed ultrasounds.



They also took blood samples to send away for testing.



And our visitors got to have front row seats!



After getting a clean bill of health, the two sea turtles were put back into the turtle box.


And were returned to the GOT safe and sound.



A special thank you to Mariah Shore who photographed the exams and provided all the images for this blog post. Click here to read about a turtle exam on Myrtle, our 550-pound green sea turtle.

- Sarah

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