EYDER PERALTA, HOST:
A sea turtle named Rhossi made a triumphant return home earlier this week. Rhossi traveled across the Atlantic, but he wasn't swimming. A cargo plane took him to Texas after three long years in Wales. How did Rhossi end up in the U.K.? Swept up in a sea current that took him over 5,000 miles from his usual habitat in the Gulf of Mexico. Now, that was a big problem for Rhossi. He's a Kemp's ridley sea turtle, a species that lives in warmer waters, not exactly what you'd find in Wales. We're now joined by Frankie Hobro. She's the director at the Anglesey Sea Zoo in Wales, where Rhossi lived the past three years and was rehabilitated, and by Dr. Joe Flanagan, who is now leading Rhossi's care team in Houston. Thank you both for joining us.
FRANKIE HOBRO: You're welcome.
JOE FLANAGAN: My pleasure.
PERALTA: So, Frankie, you've been taking care of Rhossi for the past couple of years. Tell us how you found him and what condition was he in.
HOBRO: Of course. He was reported by a dog walker. So the dog found him on the beach, and they called us. He was pretty beaten up. You know, I mean, he was very close to death. And that's when the hard work started. So obviously, it's a very, very gradual process of warming him up. Then we started looking at how we were going to get him back so that he could be released back to where he really, really belongs here in the Gulf.
PERALTA: Well, I mean, that was a long process. It took three years. Why so long?
HOBRO: Yeah. So it was a good year, really, before we were confident that Rhossi was completely healed. You know, there was quite a bit of shell damage. There was an abscess-type lesion on one of the flippers. We would have liked, actually, to send Rhossi about a year ago. We were ready. He was ready. But obviously, then, we have paperwork, which is quite frustrating. It can take quite a long time to get it in place to export from the U.K. to import to the U.S. So we had pretty much an extra year on top of what we would have liked with the delay.
PERALTA: Dr. Flanagan, you're part of the team that received Rhossi in Houston. How is he doing now?
FLANAGAN: He looks great. We received him Monday night, and we brought him down to the zoo, put him in a 10,000-gallon seawater tank, and he started swimming around pretty much nervously at the surface, very anxious. Can't point any fingers, but he's a little bit overweight.
PERALTA: (Laughter).
FLANAGAN: And so it might not be a bad idea for him to have some time for R&R here before he goes back into the Gulf.
PERALTA: Tell us a little more about Rhossi's species, Kemp's ridley sea turtles. What makes them different from other sea turtles, and how endangered are they?
FLANAGAN: So Kemp's ridleys are unique to the Gulf and Atlantic Basin. It's the smallest sea turtle of the seven different species in the world. They were extremely numerous and nest only on the beaches of Mexico and United States - mostly in Texas but a few in other states. However, the population declined rapidly between the 1940s and the early 1980s. A lot of conservation action happened. The Kemp's population has started to recover. The population this year - nesting on Texas alone, the nest count, unofficially, is actually almost close to 700, which is a tremendous comeback.
PERALTA: Frankie, Rhossi is not the first turtle to wash up in Wales. How are they getting there, and why is the climate there such a big issue for their bodies?
HOBRO: Yeah. So Rhossi's our second Kemp's ridley. We have quite a few loggerhead turtles, as well, now, which are washing up. So obviously, with the Kemp's ridleys, is really good news on the conservation side. There are more juveniles out there at the moment. They're venturing out, being carried up by the Gulf Stream, which is really nice and warm. What these turtles find is that they're cruising in nice, warm waters, feeding, really happy. And then we have the North Sea with this really cold water that suddenly mixes, suddenly churns up with these storms, and they hit this wall of cold. And turtles can't tolerate that. They literally just go into this cold stun, and they just get carried. So they don't feed. They don't swim. They don't breathe properly. They just get carried and dumped on the nearest beach.
PERALTA: Dr. Flanagan, I understand you actually came out of retirement to care for Rhossi. Why?
FLANAGAN: I worked at the Houston Zoo for 43 years. Wildlife conservation is all of our job, and you don't have to pay me to care for animals. I love doing it. When I had this opportunity to come and help out with this turtle, I jumped at the chance.
PERALTA: That's Frankie Hobro, director at the Anglesey Sea Zoo in Wales, and Dr. Joe Flanagan, the retired former chief veterinarian at the Houston Zoo. Thank you both for joining us and for the work that you do.
HOBRO: You're very welcome.
FLANAGAN: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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