Released sea turtle in Malaysia regains natural instincts

New Straits Times 18 Aug 10;

KUALA TERENGGANU: Cruise, the green turtle that was released into the sea in Cherating two weeks ago after being raised in captivity for four years, is doing well and has regained its natural instincts.

Fitted with a satellite translocator on its back, Cruise is able to transmit its location whenever it surfaces and the latest data gathered yesterday showed it was near the Con Dao islands in Vietnam.

Researchers at the Fisheries Research Institute in Rantau Abang are very encouraged by the result as it not only proves that the "city-bred" turtle is healthy but has the ability to revert to its natural instincts once released into the sea.

Turtle and Marine Ecosystem Centre (Tumec) head of technical co-ordination Syed Abdullah Syed Abdul Kadir said they were happy that the satellite translocator was working very well in tracking Cruise's position.

"As we had hoped, Cruise has totally regained its natural instincts after we released it on Aug 4 in Cherating, otherwise it could not have travelled almost 1,000 kilometres to the Con Dao islands in such a short time."

Cruise could not have chosen a better destination for its first trans-oceanic travel as it turns out the Con Dao islands has been gazetted by the Vietnamese government as a national park.

The group of 16 mountainous islands and islets were given protected status in 1984 and turned into Con Dao National Park.