Villagers have come to the rescue of about 500 fresh water turtles, reeling under the gruelling summer in Ganjam district, by getting diverted water from a canal to their drying pond.
Residents of Gollia village, 70 km from Berhampur, found that the turtles, who have been living for a long time in the pond, were hit hard in 2009 as the temperature rose and the pond started drying up.
"These creatures were in miserable condition though none of them died due to scarcity of water", Ashok Nanda, a villager, said.
The local people brought the matter to the notice of the Divisional Forest Officer (DFO), Ghumusar (South Division).
"When I came to know about the condition of the turtles due to water scarcity, I immediately approached the irrigation department and they assured that water will be released from the Baghua reservoir into the pond", said the DFO B K Mohanty.
"It is the villagers who have been protecting these turtles, treating them as an avatar of Vishnu. It is the only place in the state where such a large number of fresh water turtles are found", wildlife experts said.
The irrigation department officials released the water from the reservoir on Wednesday after personnel of the Forest department dug a one km-long canal to bring the water to the pond.
As soon as the water gushed into the pond, almost all the turtles raised their heads while floating in the water even as several of them tried to drink the fresh water, Mohanty said.
"The turtles have really got a new lease of life with the pond getting filled with water," he added.
The size of some of the turtles living in the pond is so big that a child can sit over them, a villager said. Legend has it that two of these turtles were brought to the pond at Gollia from the historic Indradyumna tank at Puri during the rule of the Bhanja dynasty.
