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Cold stun season 2009
HELP US RESCUE SEA TURTLES
“Cold-stunning” is a process that causes sea turtles to become immobile due to the dramatic decrease in water temperature (usually below 50°F) making it impossible for them to escape the cold water and migrate to warmer water. Once these turtles wash up on our beaches, it is a race for time. A cold-stunned sea turtle may appear to be dead, but may actually be alive! Without proper intervention a cold stunned sea turtle will inevitably die. The Cold-Stunned Sea Turtle Beach Patrol provides many volunteers with the satisfaction of knowing that they have made a positive contribution to helping these threatened and endangered sea turtles.
If you would like to attend a training lecture and help rescue sea turtles by patrolling your local beach, please register for one of our free lecture. You can register by calling our office at 631.369.9840 or email volunteers@riverheadfoundation.org .
Lecture schedule and locations
At Atlantis Marine World Aquarium in Riverhead, on:
September 23 (Wednesday) at 6:00 PM
September 26 (Saturday) at 2:00 PM
October 8 (Thursday) at 6:00 PM
October 17 (Saturday) at 2:00 PM
At the Marine Museum in Amagansett, 301 Bluff Road.
September 24th (Thursday) at 4 PM
At Theodore Roosevelt Nature Center, Jones Beach on:
November 1 (Sunday) at 1:30 PM
Last season the Riverhead Foundation has recovered 11 cold stunned sea turtles. Below are photos of some of the animals reported to the Riverhead Foundation by the public.
Photos taken using equippment donated by  .
An Atlantic green sea turtle was the first cold stun sea turtle of the 2007/2008 season.
A live Kemp's ridley sea turtle found on December 5, 2007 in East Hampton.
Initial medical assesment and treatment.
After a few hours of assesment the animal was placed into a tank for
monitoring.
Amber Sabrosky, a Riverhead Foundation biologist,
taking a heart rate on one of the cold stun sea
turtles during the initial assesment.
WHAT TO DO IF YOU FIND A COLD-STUNNED SEA TURTLE
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To report the stranding of a cold-stunned sea turtle, call the 24 hour emergency hotline number at 631-369-9829 immediately for further instructions and to arrange a pick up for both live and dead sea turtles. You may also report the strandings of other marine mammals (seals, dolphins, whales & porpoises) to the above emergency hotline number.
- DO NOT PLACE THE TURTLE IN WATER - PROTECT FROM FREEZING!
- DO NOT ATTEMPT TO WARM THE TURTLE! Rapid warming may cause irreversible damage to a cold-stunned reptile. Time is a factor in proper rehabilitation.
- Become a trained sea turtle beach patroller by attending one of the sea turtle cold stun lectures or by calling the Riverhead Foundation at 631.369.9840 and talking to one of the biologists.
- When you walk on the beach, search the entire beach from the dune line to the water line, check the water for floating turtles, look through the high tide line for turtles buried beneath the dried seaweed.
- You can patrol at any time, but the chances are greater for finding a turtle if you patrol after high tide, particularly after storms or extremely cold weather.
- if you have to leave the area before the rescue team arrives, CLEARLY mark the location of the turtle so that it can be quickly located.
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