Cold-stunned green sea turtles are recovering at a Florida marine life center
JUNO BEACH, Fla. (AP) — An arctic blast that brought a rare snowfall to northern Florida last week left green sea turtles as far south as St. Augustine suffering from a condition known as cold stunning.
Seventeen sea turtles that were found stranded along Florida's northeastern Atlantic Coast were brought to the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach, north of West Palm Beach, where they are rehabbing.
'When it's cold on land, it's also cold in the ocean. And that led to a number of turtles being beached or very debilitated and just floating in the water,' said Dr. Heather Barron, the chief science officer and veterinarian at the center.
The staff named named the rescued turtles after beverages, and they painted their new names on the back of their shells. Veterinarians are treating them with antibiotics, fluids and intravenous nutrition.
While it snowed as far south as northern Florida, which is extremely rare, the frigid temperatures reached South Florida. That meant cold-stunned turtles were also found along Palm Beach County's coastline.
'It is quite unusual for this to happen in Florida. Sea turtles do migrate, and typically they're migrating down to Florida for this time of year because of warmer water,' Barron said.
By Wednesday morning, Espresso, Pickle Juice and Ginger Beer were basking in the sunshine in the center's 'Party Tank.'
The turtles arrived in Juno Beach on Friday from the Marine Science Center in Volusia County, Florida. They all suffered from cold stunning, which causes sea turtles to lose mobility and become lethargic. Most of the 17 turtles are expected to be released back into the ocean in a few weeks.
Last year, turtles from Massachusetts were brought to Florida to rehab while suffering from cold stunning.
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A wheel that people could spin for a prize sat on one end. Since Pathways imposed the work requirement only on newly eligible state residents, no one lost coverage. The Arkansas experiment That's a contrast with Arkansas, where 18,000 people were pushed off Medicaid within the first seven months of a 2018 work mandate that applied to some existing beneficiaries. A federal judge later blocked the requirement . The bill that passed the U.S. House would likely cause an estimated 5.2 million people to lose health coverage, according to an analysis from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released Wednesday. Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has proposed reviving the work mandate but without requiring people to regularly report employment hours. Instead, the state would rely on existing data to determine enrollees who were not meeting goals for employment and other markers and refer those people to coaches before any decision to suspend them. 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