A few weeks ago, my wife’s social media feed included a short video of a group of tiny turtles rushing to the aid of one of their buddies who’d flipped onto his back and couldn’t get right-sided. Not only was the video both fascinating and heart-warming (they got their buddy back on her feet), but it was interesting enough for me to dive into the world-wide web “rabbit hole” to do some research on turtles in danger.
There is real danger, if you’re a turtle, in ending up feet in their air, wobbling on your shell. Left too long in this state, the little guys can die, so getting flipped right side up is a genuine concern. This brief introduction to the science of upside down turtles led me to video after video after meme after image of upside down turtles being rescued by other turtles. Whether it’s out of shared experience, shared fear or just good friends and neighbor’s policies that the turtle world deals with this a lot.
Watching the struggling turtle’s friends come to their aid, whether one on one or, in some videos a whole group of turtles, rushing in from every side–I have to admit I “invested” more than a couple of hours watching the turtle “first responders” doing their amazing jobs.
It’s not unusual for us humans to want to secure to ourselves (with some begrudging acknowledgement given to the great apes, dolphins and a few others) traits like community care and support. Once again, I’m not a scientist and my entire data pool for the turtle phenomenon is drawn from YouTube, but I think we may not be alone in working “with” each other to take care of each other. I haven’t gone looking for what other species share this trait but one thing I’m sure of–when humans, metaphorically or literally, find themselves upside down more often than not there are other humans rushing in to help them get back on their feet. And, so it seems, it’s happening every day in the turtle community.
Thank heavens for these people and–thank heavens for these turtles.
