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Lil’ Dougie goes home
A new lease on life
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The MOTE team carries the “now healthy” loggerhead turtle into the water at Siesta Beach. (Mote photo).
Rescued loggerhead sea turtle released on Siesta Beach by Jane Bartnett
n a warm and sunny August morning, Mote Marine Laboratory scientists arrived at Siesta Beach with a special delivery: a healthy, young female loggerhead turtle was going home to the Gulf waters, ready to resume her life. Her future was not as bright 73 days earlier. On Memorial Day, Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office creative communications specialist Doug Johnson and his wife Susannah were paddleboarding in Blackburn Bay and found the turtle floating, unable to submerge herself. Fearing for her safety, Doug Johnson contacted Mote Marine Laboratory. The Johnsons remained with the struggling turtle until Mote arrived and evacuated her for emergency care. “We knew we had to stay with her until Mote arrived,” Doug Johnson
said. In honor of Doug, the Mote team named the turtle Lil’ Dougie. When Lil’ Dougie arrived at Mote’s Sea Turtle Rehabilitation Hospital, her medical team discovered that part of her left front flipper was missing, likely from a shark bite. Categorized as “subadult,” she was also suffering from anemia, lethargy, and buoyancy issues. At Mote’s hospital, she was placed in a shallow rehabilitation pool, given subcutaneous fluids, and injectable antibiotics. She responded well and eagerly ate shrimp, capelin, and squid. As the weeks went by, Lil’ Dougie continued to improve. When placed in deeper water, her buoyancy issues resolved. The turtle’s damaged flipper healed well. «Not every turtle, especially a turtle with a potential shark bite or a turtle Continued on page 19
Olympic Gold Olympics star Summer McIntosh has four medals and two homes By Ned Steele
C
anada’s most decorated athlete at the Paris Olympics might never have earned her four gold medals in swimming had she not done what so many Canadians do: flee the chilly winter for the Siesta Key area’s golden sunshine. Summer McIntosh, age 17 when she won three
golds and a silver at the games last month, trained extensively for two years leading up to Paris at the elite Sarasota Sharks training facility, widely known for training future champions, just off Tamiami Trail. And after long hours of hard training in the pool, she would inevitably head to the beach with her
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friends or her mom. “We come down as much as we possibly can right after practice,” McIntosh told a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) interviewer before heading to Paris. “We’ll just sit on the beach and
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Team Canada’s Summer McIntosh poses with her gold medal in women’s 200m individual medley at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games in France on Saturday, August Continued on page 16 3, 2024. (Photo by Candice Ward/COC)
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Casting for the Kids
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