A Florida woman saw animals trapped in a dried up pond. She made a call to save them.

• An employee in a Florida shopping center noticed alligators and turtles in a drained, concrete retention pond.
• The employee called the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission for help.
• Eventually, she contacted wildlife rescuer Fairl Thomas, who rescued 10 large, softshell turtles and released them in a nearby pond.

​​​Turtles and alligators were left without food, water or shade when a concrete retention pond in Florida was drained, prompting an employee in the area to get them help that might have saved their lives.

Melissa Murray, an employee in the Shoppes of Boot Ranch shopping center in Palm Harbor, said she noticed the animals inside the pond in mid-April. The water had been drained and workers were cleaning it out, leaving the animals with nothing but mud and very little water.

She also saw someone who works for the property manager driving through the mud, trying to clear it all out.

“I saw that there was a turtle and I was like, ‘Hey! Stop the tractor,’ just letting him know that there’s a turtle over here,” she said.

The worker refused to stop, she said, so she called the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Melody Kilborn, a spokesperson for the organization, said officers responded to two complaints at the shopping center retention pond, one of which came on May 18.

“After the work on the pond was complete, the pond began filling with water. The officer observed alligators in the retention pond and noted that they all looked healthy,” wrote Kilborn.

The property manager, Walter Jakubik, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

‘A massive pit of concrete with some dried up mud’

Murray, who spotted the animals and called for help, contacted Fairl Thomas, who works with organizations to rescue wildlife. 

According to Thomas, it’s common for the animals in retention ponds to gain access through culverts or underground tunnels. When construction workers began working in the pond behind the shopping center and drained it, the animals inside had no way to get out or get to shaded areas.

They had no access to food, shade or water for about five weeks, she said.

She first went to the site on April 22. Murray and another person flagged her down and she was shocked by what she saw.

“It was just a massive pit of concrete with some dried up mud in it,” Thomas told USA TODAY. “There’s all these turtles huddled up in the corners underneath these pipes that are dripping a couple drops of water every 30 seconds or so. They were just so desperate for that moisture and anything to control their temperature.”