All about Eden.....

This week we had to change the water of Eden's tank, so we went to the sea to fill the 25L containers. Filling the tank was not easy. On the first run Vanessa and I had to get in the water which was very rough.........so of course.........We ended up getting very wet. In the second run for water we tried a place with more rocks and less waves but me.........as always.......I fell on my butt and hurt  myself due to the slippery rocks: thankfully Vanessa was nearby to help me get back on my feet!! It was quiet funny, because I fell butt-first into the water, which is not common at all!! LUCKILY......,nobody had a camera to take a picture. Either way, we had lots of fun.

Sea water collection

Back in the centre, Eden has become stronger and stronger, so it is becoming harder for us to feed him. He is still refusing to eat and of course, he doesn't like it when we put the tube through his mouth to feed him. He is becoming more stubborn by not opening his mouth, but we are more stubborn than him in that we will make sure he gains weight and energy so he can recover fast and get back into the sea.

off to be tube fed!

 The better news are that he has pooped! That is a great signal of his recovery as his digestive system is clearly going back to normal slowly.  Vanessa tried to identify the stuff inside the poop, which mostly looked like Eden's had quite a lot of barnicles in his diet. On the flipside, his buoyancy problem does not seem to get better, and we are starting to consider extracting the air inside ourselves with a syringe. We will make sure to contact the vets properly first though!   

Tube feeding Eden

Update from the Wildlife Conservation and Rehabilitation Centre....

Hello! Rebecca at the keyboard. I recently started working with MCSS and the conservation centre and my first month of trapping has been a success! So let me tell you what has been happening at the center. From the beginning of April we have been getting a lot of new Terrapins. Our traps captured a total of nine new turtles in the ponds around the Banyan Tree. It has really been an exciting month at the wildlife center.

One of the new Terrapins we caught was a female we called “Laora”, after taking some X-ray on her, we found out that she had one egg alone inside of her. The egg was really big and perfectly formed. Our theory is that she already laid the other eggs before she came inside the trap. It is not normal for a turtle to produce only one big egg.

We also had a cute small Terrapin hatchling that was caught in the trap. This was very special because we do not usually get just small terrapins in our traps. 

Rebby..the first hatchling caught in a trap!

We called it “Rebby” and it was the cutest little turtle ever. Another day, we caught three turtles in one trap!! 

3 in 1  !!

One of them must have really liked us, because it tried to climb back into the trap once we were done taking her measurements.

The trap lover!

Another exciting happening was the recapturedof terrapin “Stumpy”. She was the first Terrapin to ever X-rayed here at the wildlife centre, and one of the few who has been adopted here at Banyan Tree. She has been captured two times now, and we are all happy to have seen her again.

Stumpy's made an appearance

The team with Stumpy

Strangely, neither we, nor the hotel staff or guests, have found any terrapins randomly walking around the wetlands. We wonder if it is because they are not moving much anymore, perhaps due to the rain, or because they are becoming more aware of human presence…. Or maybe they are plotting something special!!! We will keep watching over them either way ;) 

Eden's update....

Hi all...... apologies for not updating promptly ..... we've had our hands tied with our little patient ..Eden...... here's Lea's update on him........

Eden has been at the center for a month now showing signs of recovery. However, he is not eating on his own, so we still have to force- feed him ourselves. Since, we started feeding him, he gained quiet a lot of weight (from 1905g to 2052g). We give him a mixture of food, with some medicine, squid and spinach. During the last month, he has not been in the water  to refrain him from using too much energy. But since, he has gained weight and therefore we have put him back in the water. He still has buoyancy problems, but now we have seen him trying to dive down which is a very good sign of recovery. On the other hand, we are a bit concerned over a potential hook that the veterinarian thinks may be inside Eden. We will keep monitoring it with x-rays, but if it is a hook we may have a big problems taking it out.

 Banyan tree guests have been coming to the center to see Eden, they seem to like him a lot and he seems to be comfortable with all of this attention :-). So far, most guest think that Eden is a "she" but nobody knows... Feel free to let us know what do you think about that!!

Eden's latest x-ray