Turtle rescue
It's a mystery: hundreds of turtles have lost their way
Every winter in America, volunteers regularly patrol the beaches of Cape Cod Bay to rescue turtles. Some turtles need to be rescued because they have lost their way to warm waters further South and got too cold. When a turtle gets too cold it stops moving and eating. Unfortunately this year the usual trickle of turtles has turned into a flood, and nobody knows why.
Since November, volunteers on turtle patrol have found nearly 1,200 turtles. This is the most turtles that have been found in any year. The number is about three times more than the last highest number. It is many more times the number in a normal year.
The volunteers take the turtles to places that can take care of them, such as a wildlife sanctuary. The turtles need to be warmed up carefully and they might need treatment for other health problems.
One boss of a nearby wildlife sanctuary has been saving turtles for 32 years. He remembers when he started walking the beaches, he would only find one or two turtles each winter. He would warm them up and drive them to the nearest airport where he would give the turtles to an airline pilot who was flying to Florida where it is warm. The pilot would keep the turtle in the cockpit and hand it off to a turtle expert when he landed.
Now lots of animal sanctuaries and aquariums are helping the turtles, and lots more volunteers are patrolling the beaches.
Cape Cod bay is part of the state of Massachusetts. Massachusetts is on the top right-hand side of America. It is one of 50 states in the United States of America (USA). Some turtles get lost in the bay because it looks like a wonky letter U, and they don't realise they need to swim back out into the Atlantic Ocean.
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