From TSA newsletter 4/13/2012---A special delivery of some of the
world's rarest reptiles has arrived in the Southeastern United States. Eight
critically endangered ploughshare tortoises (Astrochelys yniphora), imported by
the TSA, are now residents of Zoo Atlanta and Knoxville Zoo. They may
represent the last hope for a species marked for extinction.
Widely considered the world's most endangered tortoise species,
ploughshare tortoises are native only to Madagascar. Despite a concentrated
recovery program begun in 1986 by the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, the
population continues to founder due to the combined effects of illegal commerce
and habitat destruction. Ongoing demand on a global black market, where
ploughshare tortoises are often sold to collectors at higher than the price of
gold, may have reduced their numbers to as few as 400 individuals.
In 2008, the Recovery Plan Workshop for the Ploughshare Tortoise
suggested the establishment of a captive population outside Madagascar. The
founders of that population, a group of 10 tortoises confiscated from illegal
traders in Hong Kong and Taipei, were imported to the U.S. by the Turtle
Conservancy/Behler Chelonian Center.
Now, a second group of eight ploughshare tortoises have recently been
imported to the U.S. by the TSA by permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service. The tortoises will be housed at Zoo Atlanta and Knoxville Zoo, with
oversight from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums' (AZA) Species Survival
Plan (SSP), which manages the breeding and placement of the species in zoos
accredited by the AZA.
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