The wild journey of four cold-stranded turtles found in North Wales

‘Tonni’ the tiny loggerhead turtle was found cold-stranded on Moel-Y-Don beach on the shore of the Menai Strait, less than a mile from Anglesey Sea Zoo on 5th January 2023, by two gentle dogs, Winnie and Kerry, who were being walked on the beach by their owner, who helped to protect the little turtle from seagulls until it was rescued. Their owner never realised that the tiny turtle was still alive and immediately contacted the Sea Zoo where it was taken in for specialist intensive care. Tonni has since returned home!

Our first cold stranded turtle was Menai, who was found at the bottom of our drive on Tan-Y-Foel beach by a local man walking his dog on 12th November 2016. Menai was a full sized female Olive-Ridley turtle, she is still a record breaking turtle as the first of her species ever recorded in the UK since records began in 1748. On 28th November 2021 we rescued our next turtle who is Tally, a Kemp’s Ridley Turtle which is the rarest species in the world, only found in the Gulf of Mexico. Cold-stranded turtles often die during the process of being revived, but Tonni is the third turtle that we have rescued here so we are now experts in administering the correct techniques and treatments for comatosed turtles like Tonni during the initial critical stages of recovery.

Due to CITES regulations, rescued turtles cannot be kept on general public display so our rescued turtles, like Tonni, are kept behind the scenes for their recuperation and rehabilitation before being flown abroad for re-release.

Currently, our resources for turtle rescues are limited as we do not have a bespoke facility for this so we are limited by extremely basic equipment and conditions. Going forward, we want to change this by building a dedicated turtle rescue and rehabilitation facility – the first in the UK – to save more turtles by giving them the specialist care that they need.

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