Turtle Patient 141: Rehendi, Adult Female Olive Ridley
Rehendi was found floating with a badly cracked carapace near Kuredu Resport in Lhaviyani Atoll.
Intake Date: 3 March 2021
Patient Number: 141
Rescue Location: Lhaviyani Atoll
Reason: Found floating, cracked shell
Transport Method: Seaplane
Status: Deceased 19 March 2021
Species: Olive ridley
Scientific Name: Lepidochelys olivacea
Sex: Female
Age: Adult
Length: 69 cm
Weight: 29.55 kg
Rehendi has kindly been adopted by Stefano.
Rehendhi is an adult female olive ridley turtle, who has been named after a powerful female rule of the Maldives from the 13th century! Rehendi has a triple whammy of problems; she is buoyant, she has a substantial crack in her carapace and she has a fish hook in her oesophagus which took us totally by surprise on the x-ray. But she has all four flippers! She had surgery on Saturday to remove the fish hook and surgically clean up her carapace fractures and thankfully she is already eating really well post surgery.
15 March 2021
Rehendhi has undergone another procedure this week to wire her shell, and also to attempt to pass a stomach tube to decompress her apparently very dilated stomach. The wiring has worked relatively well (not very straight forward when you don’t have many supplies!) but, unfortunately, it wasn’t possible to pass a tube. She does continue to eat so we will monitor her closely.
22 March 2021
Unfortunately we were not able to save Rehendi who passed away on March 19. We perform postmortems on all out patients to determine cause of death as far as possible. Rehendi’s postmortem was very illuminating. It turned out that she had very severe fungal pneumonia that had destroyed her whole left lung and turned it into a bulla (an air filled sac). It is really a testament to how strong and resilient sea turtles are – she had likely been sick for months and months, and was working with one destroyed and one severely compromised lung, yet she had very little outward signs of respiratory issues.
