That video is not the Box Turtle Enclosure - The media got it wrong. That was just a video of the same kids that came back to steal the box turtles later from a locked and what we believed secure location. That was just the clearest video we had of their faces.
This is where I work. We are just heartbroken that these kids took our Box Turtles. We are very vigilant about making sure our Sulcata is safe before we leave every night but we never thought anyone was come and steal our Box Turtles!
I think you are right in your assumption that people just "release" the tortoises. I wish more people would educate themselves on the animals they are taking into their homes and understand the time commitment. We have taken in quite a few animals at our preserve, including our Sulcata. We have...
At the beginning of December, I took my little family on a week-long RV trip. This was our first time RVing and we went from Atlanta to The Gulf of Mississippi, New Orleans, Galveston, TX, San Antonio, and then back. When we stopped at an RV park near Galveston we met a HUUUUGE Sulcata Tortoise...