Shellshocked Turtles Go Home

Call it the “March of the Turtles.” Because the story of how 67 wayworn turtles, flushed miles from their watery homes by winter rain, came to be rescued and returned to the wild could easily be a good fit for the silver screen.

Ripped by floodwaters from the creeks and rivers where they make their homes, the powerful but shy Western pond turtles began washing up on Ventura County beaches as soon as the rain subsided in January. Many were badly banged up. A number were slimed with oil. Some died.

Local turtle rescuer Stephanie Pappas said she had never seen anything like it. Having been jolted from hibernation, dozens of the olive-skinned creatures were scooped off local beaches and brought to her in soup pots, ice chests and Tupperware containers.

For eight months, her Ventura home became part infirmary, part turtle motel. She nursed the sick and injured and created a turtle habitat in her backyard, where the reptiles recuperated on a steady diet of crickets and worms. She segregated the turtles according to the beaches where they were found and plotted how to get them back to their own turf.

Pappas worked for months with the state Department of Fish and Game to fashion a relocation plan, taking care not to put at further risk the animals granted protected status in California because of declining numbers.

Finally this spring, Pappas and others began relocating the pond turtles -- some with names like Bud and Spunky -- to their native river systems, sometimes hiking miles to plunk them in backcountry water holes.

So far, 56 have been relocated, including two set free Monday in a mossy pool that is connected to the Santa Clara River. Before release, Pappas had photographed the underside of each turtle’s shell, which is as unique as a fingerprint. This will allow her to track their progress over the years.

“They’ve traveled a heavy journey, I can tell you that,” said Pappas, a genetic biologist who has done volunteer turtle rescues in Ventura County for eight years and pays for the conservation efforts out of her own pocket. “From the first call to where we are now, it really is an amazing story.”

In some ways the turtles’ tale is reminiscent of another animal survival story getting plenty of public attention this summer, that of emperor penguins featured in the big-screen documentary “March of the Penguins.” The film has been a hit at the box office.

These are turbulent times for the Western pond turtle, native to the West Coast and California’s only freshwater turtle.

Once common in streams from the Canadian border to Baja, Mexico, the turtle is listed as endangered in Oregon and Washington and as a “species of special concern” in California because of its dwindling population. The state designation is a first step toward threatened status and makes it illegal to harass or take the animals, which are 4 to 8 inches long and can live to be 60 years old.

“The populations of the Western pond turtle are in dire straits,” said turtle expert Bruce Bury, a U.S. Geological Survey biologist.

He said that is especially true in Southern California, where urbanization has resulted in a loss of turtle habitat that has wiped out once thriving populations.

It’s not unusual for pond turtles to be flushed downstream by winter storms. Turtle rescuers in Ventura County say they have handled as many as 20 turtles after a big storm.

This year, the rescue calls started coming after heavy rain in mid-January, numbering about 30 that month alone. Through the media, rescue groups urged the public to be on the lookout for stray turtles, and the calls kept coming.

Many went to Jeanie Vaughan, founder and director of Montecito-based Turtle Dreams. The rescue and rehabilitation facility in Santa Barbara County took in 41 pond turtles, including some of the most severely injured.

Vaughan was instrumental in nursing back to health turtles with crushed shells, smashed heads and severed legs. Many were dehydrated; others were bleeding internally because of time spent in ocean saltwater.

“In the 10 years I’ve been doing this, this is the worst I’ve seen,” said Vaughan, who eventually transferred her turtles to Pappas for relocation. “It’s amazing to me how many survived. But it makes you wonder, too, how many we never saw that didn’t make it.”

Every aspect of the turtle release had to be carefully choreographed, a process that took months to finalize. It was just as well, Pappas said. She said she didn’t want to relocate any turtles until the creeks and rivers stopped moving so rapidly.

Moreover, she said it was important to find ideal habitat for the turtles, a search aided by the nonprofit Nature Conservancy. The environmental group has purchased and pledged to preserve a roughly 10-mile-long corridor along the Santa Clara River, a waterway believed to be home to dozens of threatened and endangered species.

With the river and its tributaries providing prime turtle habitat, the first release took place May 13 on conservancy land between Ventura and Santa Paula.

“This is the fun part of the job,” said E.J. Remson, the conservancy’s point man in Ventura County. “When you have an animal in your hand and get to put it back in its place, and know it’s going to do well because of the work you’ve done to conserve the habitat where it lives, it’s just really great.”

Remson was back Monday along with Pappas and her boyfriend, John Keough, putting two more turtles back where they belonged. With a machete, Remson whacked through thistle and mustard to arrive at a murky pool unlikely to be visited by other humans.

The smaller turtle lay still in a clear plastic box, while the bigger one used its long claws to try to scale the smooth sides of a bucket.

“OK, little guy, good luck,” Pappas told the small one as it left her hand and quickly vanished into the water. The second turtle took a dip, then immediately headed for higher ground.

“I always tell people you can’t save a species without a lot of involvement,” Pappas said. “Look at how many people were involved in getting these turtles back to the water.”