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  The New Straits Times 12 Dec 06
Nursed back to health, 70-year-old green turtle returns to the sea
Thanks to alert from Loretta Ann Soosayraj

ALOR STAR: After 76 days of treatment and care, a turtle, which was in serious condition after swallowing plastic bags, was released into the sea on Dec 3.

The green turtle, weighing 155kg, said to be one of the largest to land in Malaysia over the past 15 years, was found on Sept 18 at Kuala Sungai Muda, Kedah, by a six-year-old boy who saw the reptile struggling in the mud.

The turtle was believed to have been making its way back to the sea after laying eggs on the beach when it ate plastic bags left on the beach by litterbugs. It took six men to carry the reptile inland where villagers dug a hole and placed the animal inside.

News of the landing, the first after 45 years, spread and before long, hundreds of people came to see the reptile.

The animal was then sent to a fisheries centre in Pulau Sayap, Kedah, where it was kept in a 40-tonne tank and fed fish and seaweed for 67 days.

Turtle Marine Ecosystem Centre (Tumec) director Kamaruddin Ibrahim said in Kuala Terengganu that the turtle was weak when it was first discovered.

Measuring 1.07 metres, the turtle was over 70 years old, making it the oldest of the reptiles that had come to Malaysian shores. Generally, green turtles weigh an average of 130kg and grow up to a metre in length.

It was released off Pulau Songsong in Kedah, an area relatively safe from trawler fishing boats.

"Despite being one of the biggest green turtles we have seen in the last decade, we did not want to keep it confined. We tagged it to monitor its whereabouts," he added.
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