Welcome, Stumpy!

There’s a new kid on the block at the MBL, and he’s a turtle named Stumpy.

Stumpy is a 20-year-old, diamondback terrapin who belongs to the Woods Hole Science Aquarium. The Aquarium closed earlier this month for repairs to its foundation, and Stumpy moved to the MBL’s Marine Resources Center (MRC) as a temporary home.

Also arriving from the Aquarium over the next few weeks are about 15 local fish and invertebrate species, which will be housed in their own tanks in the MRC.

“They are all local species, so we don’t have to worry about invasives. We’ll just plug them into our existing MRC seawater systems, which draw raw seawater from Great Harbor,” says Lisa Abbo, MBL’s veterinarian and director of the Marine Resources Department.

It’s been a while since a turtle was living at MBL. “MBL used to collect turtles for researchers, but not in recent years,” says Abbo.

Staff from the Aquarium will come over to the MRC daily to feed and care for their animals during the renovation. Stumpy likes herring, capelin and krill, but his favorite is shrimp, according to the Aquarium’s online bio of Stumpy.

As a little hatchling in Maryland, Stumpy was found injured and was rescued and rehabilitated, but his caregivers determined he wasn’t releasable to the wild. He has been at the Aquarium since 2008.

During the Aquarium’s foundation repair, its water and life support systems will be offline for about eight months. While MBL is housing some of their species during that time, others will be released or re-homed, including Bubba the harbor seal, who is going to a new permanent home at the Fort Wayne Zoo.

The Aquarium team will close the seal pool to the public at the end of Saturday, September 20, to prepare Bubba for transport to his new home. The public is invited to stop by before then to wish Bubba well. The interior of the museum is now closed.

Established in 1875, the Woods Hole Science Aquarium is the country’s oldest marine aquarium. It is owned by the federal government and operated by NOAA Fisheries.

“Whenever an opportunity like this arises to help one of the other science institutions in Woods Hole, we are quick to do that. We help each other,” Abbo says. “For example, when MBL has students here in our high school programs, NOAA Fisheries biologist Katie Dever gives them a personalized tour of the Aquarium.”