Announcing the Chersina Angulata Working Group
You may have noticed some increased activity on the forum around Bowsprit tortoises lately. About 3 months ago, after talking to many, many people (the majority of which are on the forum), I initiated a project which was ultimately named the “Chersina Angulata Working Group”.
Though the project has affiliations with the Zoo I work with, primarily for the purposes of creating a North American studbook, it was founded by individuals. Over the past 3 months, we have been collecting as much information as we can about the species, both in-situ and in historical US based collections. In the US, this species has earned the reputation of being very difficult to maintain successfully, while in some areas of the world, they are known to be hearty and resilient. These opposing views intrigued many of us and prompted the creation of this group.
Our mission includes the following:
1) Obtain a large captive colony of C. angulata in the US as founders of at least 5 disparate breeding groups around the country.
2) Through collaboration, understand and document successful captive husbandry techniques.
3) Build a sustainable CB generation in the US.
4) Create and maintain an official North American studbook.
Today the group consists of the following founding members (in alphabetical order):
We will be working diligently to accomplish the mission outlined above and will be reporting our progress here, on the Tortoise Forum. We are trying to get a separate “Bowsprit Tortoise” section on the forum so watch for that in case this thread moves.
Please consider this notification a call for help. If you know of any Bowsprit tortoises in the US, we would like to know about them. If you have prior experiences with these animals you can share with us, please do.
I am also very excited to share our newest additions to the group. The attached adult females have been recently acquired and will hopefully be major contributors to our breeding group going forward.
Thanks to all of you I have spoken to over the past few months – Most notably:
@Will , @Tom , @HermanniChris , @kingsley , Dwight Lawson, @zovick , @CarolM, @JeannineD and Jonathan Gray.
You may have noticed some increased activity on the forum around Bowsprit tortoises lately. About 3 months ago, after talking to many, many people (the majority of which are on the forum), I initiated a project which was ultimately named the “Chersina Angulata Working Group”.
Though the project has affiliations with the Zoo I work with, primarily for the purposes of creating a North American studbook, it was founded by individuals. Over the past 3 months, we have been collecting as much information as we can about the species, both in-situ and in historical US based collections. In the US, this species has earned the reputation of being very difficult to maintain successfully, while in some areas of the world, they are known to be hearty and resilient. These opposing views intrigued many of us and prompted the creation of this group.
Our mission includes the following:
1) Obtain a large captive colony of C. angulata in the US as founders of at least 5 disparate breeding groups around the country.
2) Through collaboration, understand and document successful captive husbandry techniques.
3) Build a sustainable CB generation in the US.
4) Create and maintain an official North American studbook.
Today the group consists of the following founding members (in alphabetical order):
- Dwight Lawson – CAWG Cofounder
- Chris Leone – CAWG Cofounder
- Tom Roach – CAWG Cofounder
- Kingsley Rodrigo - CAWG Cofounder
- Dan Sterantino – CAWG Cofounder, Director and Studbook keeper
We will be working diligently to accomplish the mission outlined above and will be reporting our progress here, on the Tortoise Forum. We are trying to get a separate “Bowsprit Tortoise” section on the forum so watch for that in case this thread moves.
Please consider this notification a call for help. If you know of any Bowsprit tortoises in the US, we would like to know about them. If you have prior experiences with these animals you can share with us, please do.
I am also very excited to share our newest additions to the group. The attached adult females have been recently acquired and will hopefully be major contributors to our breeding group going forward.
Thanks to all of you I have spoken to over the past few months – Most notably:
@Will , @Tom , @HermanniChris , @kingsley , Dwight Lawson, @zovick , @CarolM, @JeannineD and Jonathan Gray.
