{"id":48786,"date":"2025-11-11T23:25:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T23:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/48786\/"},"modified":"2025-11-11T23:25:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T23:25:08","slug":"meet-porkchop-the-aquarium-of-the-pacifics-rescued-green-sea-turtle-long-beach-post-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/48786\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Porkchop, the Aquarium of the Pacific’s rescued green sea turtle \u2022 Long Beach Post News"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article was originally published by LAist<\/a> on Nov. 11, 2025.<\/p>\n

The Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach isn\u2019t just a major attraction for tourists and locals alike \u2014 it\u2019s also a sea turtle rescue, endangered shark breeder, a frog nursery and more.<\/p>\n

The aquarium has long supported conservation efforts across the Pacific Ocean, and now those efforts are expanding.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are international conservation efforts all around the world that would benefit from the knowledge and expertise of the professionals at the aquarium,\u201d said\u00a0new Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Flocken<\/a>. \u201cSo we\u2019re going to be learning in both directions, taking what we learn from other groups, but also trying to bring the knowledge that we\u2019ve already built here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Flocken, who is trained as a lawyer and previously served as president of Humane Society International, succeeds Dr. Peter Kareiva, who had a five-year contract starting in 2020 and left his post at the aquarium to pursue science and conservation advocacy work.<\/p>\n

Reporters this week got a behind-the-scenes look at the aquarium\u2019s growing sea turtle rescue efforts and a new partnership to boost populations of the endangered Indo-Pacific zebra shark.<\/p>\n

Rescuing green sea turtles<\/p>\n

The San Gabriel River has become home to\u00a0a population of green sea turtles<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 the creatures have made a remarkable comeback after once being on the brink of extinction.<\/p>\n

But living in one of most urbanized rivers in the world has its risks. Earlier this year, aquarium staff rescued a young turtle entangled in fishing lines, caught on debris, and on the brink of death. The turtle was found by volunteers participating in the aquarium\u2019s Southern California Sea Turtle Monitoring\u00a0community science program<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Aquarist Stacy Hammond with Porkchop, who is having a breakfast of romaine lettuce. Photo by Erin Stone, LAist.<\/p>\n

One of the turtle\u2019s front flippers was tangled in fishing lines and stuck in debris. The line cut off the blood to one of her front flippers, so staff eventually had to amputate it. A fishing hook was lodged in the back of her neck.<\/p>\n

Now, the sea turtle has gotten a second chance at life \u2014 and having just three flippers doesn\u2019t seem to be hindering her. (Experts aren\u2019t entirely certain of the turtle\u2019s sex, but guess she is female given the smaller size of her tail.)<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has not seemed to faze her at all. She navigates great,\u201d said senior aquarist Stacy Hammond. \u201cShe ate right away, which is uncommon for our rescue sea turtles. She eats very well.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s why staff nicknamed her Porkchop. They expect to be able to release her back into the wild before the end of the year. She\u2019s one of four the aquarium has rescued this year.<\/p>\n

The aquarium\u00a0has rescued and rehabilitated a variety of sea turtles since 2000<\/a>, all of which found in U.S. waters are either endangered or threatened species. Now they\u2019re expanding that work by building an expanded enclosure with specialty equipment and medical supplies.<\/p>\n

Saving endangered zebra sharks<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Fern, a female zebra shark who is helping to repopulate her endangered kin in Southeast Asia. Photo by Erin Stone, LAist.<\/p>\n

The aquarium\u2019s expanded conservation work also includes joining a global effort to recover populations of the endangered zebra shark in Indonesia, where overfishing and habitat degradation has decimated the population.<\/p>\n

The aquarium is home to\u00a0a zebra shark named Fern<\/a>, who has the necessary genetics from that region. Her viable eggs will be flown first to the Seattle Aquarium, which will prepare them for transport to Indonesia. Then, when the shark embryos hatch and mature, they\u2019ll be released into a marine protected area off the coasts of the Raja Ampat archipelago to help recover the species\u2019 population there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had one of the first successful\u00a0artificial inseminations<\/a>\u00a0with the zebra shark here at the aquarium, and that becomes important as a potential means of managing genetics across populations,\u201d said Nate Jaros, the aquarium\u2019s vice president of animal care. \u201cSo this is all part of rebuilding that population.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This article was originally published by LAist on Nov. 11, 2025. The Aquarium of the Pacific in Long…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-48786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}