TortoiseForum.org

This article appears today on front page of LA Times (Sunday 05/11/08). I could not believe that the Army from and around Ft. Irwin, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Bureau of Land Management allegedly violating the Federal Endangered Species Act by moving, relocating these DTs to Mojave Desert, away from their natural and normal habitat near the Army's National Training Center ar Fort Irwin. You can check this at On latimes.com/tortoise. We should do something to prevent futher damages. If anyone know more infos about this, please share with the rest of us. Thanks.

holy smokes did i miss this article?! *frantically searches for todays paper*

okay, i found it here: Slow, steady -- and under siege

I am in NJ and actually heard something about this a few weeks ago.

This is my personal feelings on this subject and I am rather emotional about it. I have tried to tone it down.
But in my opinion it is wrong, just plain wrong.

Yes it is true. They moved about 760 DT from around Ft. Irwin. This has been in the works for some time. And the CTTC and other environmental organizations have been fighting against the move. Law suits are being filed. Yes, these are an endangered species in the wild. Yes they were moved into areas that the wild DT populations have been found to be infected with RI, the area they were moved to have been know for off road vehicle traffic, closer to human populated area, drought and now the coyotes.
This is what was agreed upon “As mitigation”, the Army agreed to move the tortoises from the expansion area onto unoccupied public lands.” The move was conduted in March because that is when the DT are most active. They have just come out of hibernation and are looking for food, water and a mate. Soon after the deserts heat up and these lovely creatures go underground and are hard to locate so the move had to be done in March.

I like so many others here in CA feel this is a travisty. But we are talking about our Military and our national security. Both will out trump the poor DT. And even after they have moved 760 torts and had so many devistated so soon after the move they are still talking about moving another 1200. “In years to come, the Army plans to relocate an additional 1,200 tortoises from the western edge of the base to prevent them from being squashed by military equipment.” Have we learned nothing by this first move. I don’t say we leave them to get squashed, and I know they say the military must expand this training area. However there must be a better plan a better outcome for these translocated DT. But evidently when it comes to our military Endanged species do not really count.

I don't understand why Mike Connor hasn't offered for the tortoises to be moved onto the Desert Tortoise Preserve. Isn't that why CTTC is buying land to form the preserve?

Yvonne

[quote=Crazy1]
This is my personal feelings on this subject and I am rather emotional about it. I have tried to tone it down.
But in my opinion it is wrong, just plain wrong.






Hi Robyn,

You don't have to hold back your anger. This is one of the many issues that our own government has done badly and never admit that they are wrong. You could write letters to our senators, governer, representatives, and others that we can think of to express our concern and disappointment of how these agencies have damaged our state endangered tortoises. May be we should contact other countries that believe strongly in protecting, nuturing and repopularizing the endangered species, to let them know that the U.S.A has committed this terrible act. We have sent many scientists, biologists, and other professionals all over the world to work and to try saving as many endangered animals as possible , and here we are, in our practically own backyard, our government does just the opposite. I'm sorry I don't have the addresses of those I've mentioned above, I have to search back at my own emails and perhaps to google some, unless someone in this forum have them ready for all of us here at TF.

Minh

Minh, I have written letters to the Gov., my Senator and my state representatives. Like usual you get nothing back or you get a pat response that they received your letter. I was at our meeting early this month and a rep from the DT reserve gave a talk regarding the preserve. Yep, the very preserve Mike Conner is involved in. It seems they are using the land to preserve the torts that are there. They have people that are replanting native plants and setting up water catch areas as the drought has done so much damage with new plantings etc. The talk was informative about the preserve but she new little or nothing, or would not talk about the move. She did state she was fairly new here from Minnesota. The land they just acquired didn’t’ seem very large. Like I said they, the CTTC is involved. They are filing suit they are trying to stop the further removal of any DT. How successful they will be is questionable. Yes, I think we as a Turtle, Tortoise community need to be heard. I can’t even imagine the amount of acreage that would be needed for 1200 DT. But as the paper stated the cost of moving the 760 they moved was, I believe 8.7 billion dollars.

Each person needs to find the assembly person in their district and write to them, their Senator and the Gov. Plus contact your local CTTC and Rescue Groups and ask what they are doing and how you can get involved.
Since I have had my foster DT I have found them such sweet loving social creatures it makes me cry just thinking of the devastation this move has made on them and their population.

Here's a link to a petition on this subject. When you get to the end, after following all the directions, and hit "send" it looks like nothing happens, but it does go, and a few minutes after I hit "send" and nothing happened, I received an acknowledgement email thanking me for signing the petition.

Yvonne

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stoptor...nslocation

As for this purpod peep, we are 'signed, sealed, delivered'! Many, many thanx for that link, Yvonne!! You can be sure I will pass it on to others as well ~

purpod