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Turtle and Tortoise Newsletter, Issue 3Ashton, President of Ashton Biodiversity Research &Preservation Institute and series editor of the Rare andEndangered Biota of Florida. Scientists, zoo officials,conservation organizations, and others from around the worldcame together to develop procedures to help direct relocationand other efforts to save many of the endangered andthreatened turtles and tortoises around the world. Topicssuch as ethics, spread of disease, genetics, environmentalconcerns, and management of habitat were discussed andthe best management protocol was developed. The meetingwas designed in a “Roundtable” format allowing participationand active discussion on topics such as “ChelonianAssurance Colonies” or, collections maintained byindividuals, governments, zoos and others around theworld to produce future stock of turtles that could bereleased back into their habitat in the future.Development Crowds Out Tortoise Habitat in FloridaThere are no easy answers regarding such problems asare found in Florida where the Gopher Tortoise is relativelycommon in its native uplands habitat. However theseupland habitats are now the target of massive developmentfor the rapidly growing human population in the state andtortoise populations are being destroyed. Meanwhile in areassuch as state parks and other government owned refuges,the tortoises are dying of Upper Respiratory Tract Disease(URTD). This is a disease of tortoises and does not affecthumans or other animals. The Florida Fish and WildlifeConservation Commission has been unsuccessful in tryingto come up with solutions to these problems for many years.Relocations can Spread Disease that Threatens Tortoiseand Turtle PopulationsThe desert tortoise found in the western United Statesis having problems similar to those of the Gopher Tortoise,loss of habitat due to development and spreading of URTD.Relocations without following a protocol that tests fordiseases can compound the problems. In France and otherEuropean countries many pet tortoises and turtles are beingreleased for “humanitarian” reasons and these releases impactthe natural environments and potentially spread disease toother turtles. Impacts to the environment can include:crowding out of native species when non-native turtles ortortoises are released or when groups of native cheloniansfrom another location are placed into an already existingpopulation, interrupting the natural food chain in a habitat,introduction of diseases, physical changes to the habitat bythe actions of the introduced animal or by increased wastesproduced by the un-natural increase in animals, etc.Roundtable Consensus Demands Well-Planned RelocationsThe consensus of expert opinions created by theRoundtable can be summarized by saying that relocationmust be well planned and studied before it is attemptedand that agencies must require thorough investigationsinto the potential impacts of relocations before theyallow them to take place. Relocations should have a clear,measurable goal based on a strong conservation purposethat is centered on benefits for the species and the habitatwhere the relocation will take place. Landowners andcommunities should be involved and it is extremelyimportant to monitor the impacts of the relocation after ithas taken place to determine impacts.Asian Chelonian Crisis due to Demand in China for Foodand Medicinal ProductsA major worldwide crisis has developed because of therecent surge in the demand for turtles and tortoises in thefood and medicinal markets of China. Hundreds ofthousands of turtles are imported into China daily forconsumption and because certain species are prized overothers (as attested to in recent articles on ChineseOlympians drinking turtle blood for strength and vitality)many have been recently added to the list of highlyendangered species by CITES. Since the market for theseis so great, local villagers can essentially double theirannual income by seeking out and selling certain turtles inSoutheast Asia. The International Roundtable, as a methodto save some of these animals for the future, has created theChelonian Assurance Colonies.Chelonian Assurance Colonies Bank Turtle and TortoiseSpecies for the FutureChelonian Assurance Colonies are actually manycollections of live turtles and tortoises whose managers arecooperating with each other and the countries involved tomaintain thousands of animals whose offspring maysomeday restock the wild once the current crises are over.This may take several human and turtle generations beforeconservation efforts come to grip with the real problems ofhabitat loss and over consumption. This effort is unique inthat it brings together the traditional collections oftenfound in zoos with those of private collectors andprofessional turtle and tortoise breeders who happen to bebreeding these once common, now endangered speciesfor the multi-billion dollar reptile pet trade. TheRoundtable brought in some of the top veterinarians,geneticists and research biologists to layout the methodsthat must be used if these collections are to work for thepreservation of chelonian species.The work of the International Roundtable on ChelonianRelocation and Assurance Colonies will be published in asimple Protocol that will hopefully help governmentalagencies, conservation organizations and others in theproper development of relocation efforts around the world.This book is expected to be available in 2001.20
Preliminary Comments on Building Chelonian LibrariesJOHN P. LEVELLNorthStar Herpetological’s Biblioteca Chelonia - Turtle and Tortoise Book ShopP.O. Box 389, Lanesboro, MN 55949 USA; Email: emys@menas.netBooks, periodicals and other assorted publications onturtles, turtle literature if you will, have always been ofmajor interest to those who work with chelonians on aregular basis. Although the same is undoubtedly true inmany other areas of study as well, “turtle people” overall,whether hobbyist, wildlife manager, conservationist oracademic researcher, to a greater or lesser extent almostinvariably all build some sort of reference library. Whilesome will be content with a few select titles of rather narrowtaxonomic scope, many more ardent “chelonian bibliophiles”(this author included) can amass truly prodigiousselections of somehow relevant titles.Regardless of library scope or size, everyone interestedin turtles and tortoises likewise seems to be activelysearching for at least one more publication to add to theirbookshelves. Trouble is, with few notable exceptions, muchof what has been written on turtles including a fair numberof relatively recently released titles can prove to besomewhat difficult to find at best.Naturally, a number of factors are at least partiallyresponsible for the overall lack of readily available turtlepublications. Targeting an obviously somewhat limitedaudience, for example, means that most books on turtles areproduced in very small press runs to begin with and smallpress runs in turn translates into limited quantities. Whilesome of the most popular titles have been reprintedmultiple times and/or in differing formats (i.e. Pope’sTurtles of the United States and Canada, Carr’s Handbookof Turtles, Pritchard’s Encyclopedia of Turtles, Ernst andBarbour’s Turtles of the World), most volumes on turtlesare printed only once and when all copies have been soldsuch titles are basically gone.While also typically printed in small numbers, turtlepublications produced outside of the United States,including a substantial number of important Englishlanguage references of value to those interested in speciesfound outside of North America, present the additionalproblem of relative obscurity as well. More simply put, beforeone realizes such publications even exist they are often nearlyif not already completely out-of-print. This, in combinationwith all too common difficulties in dealing with manyforeign publishers and the obvious competition from otheroverseas purchasers, results in only a tiny fraction of thecopies produced ever entering the U.S. marketplace.Similar problems likewise effect the availability ofsmaller publications on turtles appearing in the notes,transactions and proceedings produced by museums bothhere in the U.S. and overseas. Factor in the very realtendency of herpetologists in general, and of turtle peoplein particular to retain rather than recycle relevantreferences as needed and it becomes clearer as to why manyJanuary, 2001turtle publications are so difficult find. In fact, in the case ofsome rarer chelonian titles, one basically has to wait untilsome colleague dies (obviously not high on anybody’s listof things to wish for) and their library dissolved before asingle copy is again available for purchase.Obviously, basic economic principals related to the“law of supply and demand” will largely determine justhow much one has to pay in order to obtain the referencesneeded. Generally speaking older titles, subjected as theyare to the loss and destruction naturally associated with theprocesses of aging, will be proportional more expensivethan more recently released publications. This isparticularly true of important early references such asHay’s Fossil Turtles of North America (1908), Garman’sThe Galapagos Tortoises (1917), Günther’s The GiganticLand Tortoises (Living and Extinct) in the Collection of theBritish Museum (1877), as well as numerous other oldertitles on chelonians, which routinely sell for severalhundred dollars per copy or more. Really rare titles,original editions of Anatome Testudinis Europaeae byBojanus (1819-1821) or Thomas Bell’s A Monograph ofthe Testudinata (1832-1842) for example, can besubstantially more expensive indeed, with copies (ifavailable at all) commanding prices exceeding those ofmany brand new automobiles.A number of more recently out-of-print butnevertheless still highly sought after turtle publications,while proportionally less expensive than those mentionedabove, may likewise easily cost two to three times more nowthan they did when originally released. Volumes likeCann’s Tortoises of Australia (1978), Frieberg’s Turtles ofSouth America (1981), Pritchard’s The Alligator SnappingTurtle (1989), and even the 1971 Dover Publicationsreprint of Babcock’s classic review of New England’sturtles certainly all must be included in this category.Virtually any out-of-print title on turtles, however, willonly increase in value as time passes.Everything considered, this all means that it is farbetter to add wanted items to one’s collection sooner ratherthan later. Based on the author’s experiences as bothchelonian library builder and as a natural history bookdealer, doing so requires some degree of patience, a littleluck, and a fair amount of work. At the same time,experience has also taught me that the rewards associatedwith thumbing through the pages of some long covetedvolume, or with finally adding that last essential referenceneeded to complete the perfect turtle library, makes all theeffort worthwhile. Until next time, “Nuff Said” .Editors’ Note: Starting in the next issue, JohnLevell will be doing a regular column on book reviews.21
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