{"id":137381,"date":"2026-01-30T07:49:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-30T07:49:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/137381\/"},"modified":"2026-01-30T07:49:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T07:49:11","slug":"sea-turtle-with-3-flippers-swims-free-after-florida-rehab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/137381\/","title":{"rendered":"Sea turtle with 3 flippers swims free after Florida rehab"},"content":{"rendered":"

JUNO BEACH, Fla. — Cheers rose from a bundled-up crowd as a loggerhead sea turtle<\/a> that survived a likely shark attack trundled back into the ocean after months of rehabilitation in Florida, carrying a satellite tracker to see how she fares with only three flippers.<\/p>\n

The air on the beach was chilly, with temperatures in the 40s Fahrenheit (roughly 4 to 9 degrees Celsius ). But the Atlantic Ocean has hovered around a comfortable 77 F (25 C), said Heather Barron, chief science officer and a veterinarian at the Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach. <\/p>\n

To acclimate the turtle for reentry, the facility kept her tank\u2019s water temperature at around 80 F (27 C), Barron said. Beachgoers snapped photos as the turtle crawled down the sand, the satellite tracker\u2019s long antenna waving in the air, before she disappeared into the waves.<\/p>\n

The turtle was named Pyari, a Hindi term of endearment meaning \u201clovely\u201d or \u201cbeloved.\u201d She arrived at the center in November from the nearby Inwater Research Group. <\/p>\n

Some kind of predator had tried to make a meal of her, the marine center said in a statement, leaving Pyari with extensive injuries to her neck, shell and both front flippers. That led to the amputation of most of her left forelimb.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely always very gratifying to see these animals go back into their ocean home,\u201d Barron said. \u201cAnd I think it\u2019s particularly gratifying when you can track them on satellite, and see exactly where they\u2019re going and what they\u2019re doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

While those satellite tags are expensive, about $10,000 each, Barron said it’s important to gather data on these three-legged turtles because scientists know very little about how well they do after rehabilitation.<\/p>\n

In addition to Pyari, the center is tracking two other amputees, she said. “Every little bit of information helps us to understand the behavior and the success of these animals.\u201d <\/p>\n

Follow the journey<\/a> of Pyari and the other turtles on the center’s website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JUNO BEACH, Fla. — Cheers rose from a bundled-up crowd as a loggerhead sea turtle that survived a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":137382,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[67076,1684,1111,28,30,29,477,555,9913,554,46663,1110],"class_list":{"0":"post-137381","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-67076","9":"tag-animals","10":"tag-article","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-florida-headlines","13":"tag-florida-news","14":"tag-general-news","15":"tag-lifestyle","16":"tag-oddities","17":"tag-science","18":"tag-turtles","19":"tag-u-s-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137381\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137382"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}