A green turtle tangled in the fishing line on the San Gabriel River and was released back to the ocean on Friday at Seal Beach, a three-month recovery at the aquarium in the Pacific Long Beach.
During a routine inspection on the San Gabriel River in early July, the female tortoise was discovered by workers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The worker found the fishing line wrapped around her forefoot fin and cut into her mouth.
The 132-pound tortoise was taken to the aquarium in Long Beach, where the veterinarian removed the fishing line and sewed the wound.
After three months of recovery, the Green Turtle returned to the wild Friday. On the morning she released, about 30 people gathered in the sunshine of Seal Beach.
Brittany Stevens is a Pacific Veterinarian’s aquarium where he recovered from the Turtle (Turtle) was restored. She said fishing lines are a consistent threat to animals.
“It’s probably one of the first things we see animals in need of care, it’s some kind of fishing interaction, whether it’s a discarded line or a hook,” Stevens said. “So we always encourage people not to cut off their lines and then let go of the lines so that animals like her don’t get entangled or possibly eat it.”
The Eastern Pacific Green Turtle is a species found primarily on the California coast and is classified as a threatened species. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, tortoises nest in summer and travel to California in the summer are primarily threatened by debris accidentally caught in fishing lines, boats and fishing nets.
“Their numbers in the wild are very low. So it’s important for everyone we save.”
Dawn Nygren-Burkert, a Pacific Conservation Volunteer Coordinator who tracks turtle activity, said the river areas where the turtle were found were an important habitat for the species.
Nygren-Burkert said garbage and city waste are the main threat to rivers and surrounding wetlands, but are subject to local aquarium monitoring and wetland restoration efforts led by volunteers.
City representatives, lifeguards and passing surfers stopped to watch and take pictures as the tortoise was lifted from the aquarium truck and placed on the beach on volunteer shells.
When a little girl in the crowd screamed happily, the turtle ran from the sea to the people gathered on the beach. The volunteers quickly hang the rebellious turtle back to the shore for a rest, and eventually, she returned to the waves.
