News from TSA India
 Shailendra Singh, Director of TSA India, has been very busy over the previous few months and has lots of great news to share!
First of all, significant progress is being made on the new education center that is being constructed at the Turtle Conservation Center in Garhaita. India currently has more people under the age of 25 than the entire United States population and this target group is soon going to be able to greatly influence India's conservation revolution in across a wide range of political formats. By targeting this group with a wide variety of culturally-appropriate education programs, it is hoped dramatic improvements in species survival can be expected in the near future.
 Shai, with the assistance of RK Sharma, also recently conducted an aquatic wildlife workshop for more than 100 forest department staffers in Madhya Pradesh. The workshop coincided with World Wetlands Day on February 2 and featured a variety of topics including survey techniques, turtle identification, nest collection and the India Wildlife Protection Act. In addition, participants were given a tour of the Batagur kachuga nurseries at Deori Eco-Center (a collaboration of TSA, Madras Crocodile Bank Trust and Madhya Pradesh Forestry Department) to learn about husbandry and conservaton techniques. This training and refresher workshop was organized to make the frontline staff more efficient while helping with routine surveys and patroling along the Chambal river and other protected wetlands of the state. |
A Loss in the Conservation Community
On February 14, many of us awoke and learned of the tragic death of John Thorbjarnarson, or John T. as he was better known to friends and colleagues.
John was a highly regarded crocodilian biologist, who also made his mark in the chelonian community. Please click here to read more about his life and his untimely passing. |
In the Literature
Occasionally, we'd like to share with you some of the recent turtle and tortoise publications that we have found to be noteworthy. Please see the summaries below and click the link to access a pdf of the full article.
From both the point of view of a person seeking a pet and from a conservation perspective Russian tortoises are one of the worst possible candidates available from the wild-caught reptile pet trade. Yet, for a variety of political and economic reasons this small tortoise has become one of the most commonly marketed species. Since the 1970s well over one million wild-caught adult Russian tortoises have been imported into the U.S. alone. Probably less than one or two percent of these are alive today.
Do breeding facilities for chelonians threaten their stability in the wild?
After a short introduction into the aims of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and the definition of the different breeding categories used by CITES, the authors present and evaluate import and export statistics of different species and countries. These show many cases of incorrect and inconsistent data, in some cases chelonians are misidentified, or they enter into a country as "wild caught" and leave it as "captive bred." Examples of typical trading routes are given and named. We address the limits of CITES and show possibilities for the importing countries to improve the conservation status, i.e. by double-checking non-detriment findings, as is mandatory for each import into the European Union. |
