Oklahoma Sea Turtle To Leave For Texas

A Green Sea Turtle who's on the mend is spending her last full day at the Oklahoma Aquarium.

She's been there for eight years but moves to a new home in Texas Thursday.

“She's got paralysis in her rear end," said Director of Education and Research Ann Money

She was struck by a boat ten years ago in Florida. She spent a couple of years at the Georgia Turtle Center.

"They need a home for her and needed a home pretty quickly, and there was no place for her to go, so we took her on and we fostered her," said Money. 

Thalassia, that's the turtle’s name, comes from the seagrass Green Sea Turtles eat. She just needed a safe place to live until she got bigger.

"She was deemed un-releasable," Money said. 

When she came here she was small, only weighed 11 pounds. Now she's a much healthier 60 pounds, and strong enough to get herself to the bottom of the tank where she will sleep.

"This girl if she were not injured, could get to be 4 or 5 hundred pounds. They can live to be 120 or 130," Money said. 

So, at about 12 she's got a long way to go. Ann said the U.S. has done well at protecting seas turtles.

“So, Loggerheads and Greens have been taken off the endangered list, so they are threatened in the U.S.," said Money. 

When she gets to her new home, she'll have two other Green Sea Turtle tank-mates to spend the rest of her life with.

A team from the Sea Life Grapevine Aquarium will come to Jenks Thursday and drive Thalassia to her new home in Texas.