Looking for information on a confiscation in the 1970s. I know the animals were sent off to an island off of Georgia, and were the source of many that ended up in zoos.
Just looking for the story
Just looking for the story
Information on radiated tortoise confiscation in the 1970s
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@zovick might have info on that.
That was St. Catherines Island and @zovick was very active with the Bronx Zoo (WCS) and St. Catherines back then. If anyone will have details it will be him!
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Here you go, with the whole background story as well:
In 1969, Robert Baudy, a FL animal dealer who sold many rare animals, but primarily large cats, went to Madagascar on a collecting trip and legally brought back approximately 50 Radiated Tortoises. Over the next few years, he sold some of this group periodically to raise money. I even purchased a couple of them myself in 1969 and in 1972.
In 1975, the Bronx Zoo opened the St. Catherine's Island Survival Center (SCSC) on the same-named Island in GA. In anticipation of the opening of SCSC and knowing that this would be a perfect location for Radiated Tortoises, John Behler and I felt that Baudy's group provided a significant conservation project in the making and therefore made the decision to attempt to purchase all of Baudy's remaining group to prevent it from further dissolution via any more piecemeal sales. John visited with Baudy for a day and ultimately drove away with the 27 Radiated Tortoises which were still in Baudy's possession. These animals were maintained by Dr. Walter Auffenburg in FL until the facility on St. Catherine's Island was completed, then they were moved to the island.
At that time, the group had a number of large females, but was lacking in larger males. I had several adult males in my personal collection, so the decision was made to move some of my males to SCSC to augment the breeding program. The program soon began to have successful hatchings and in 1976, received the prestigious AZA Bean Award for the most significant breeding achievement of that year.
Once word of this program and its success began to be known in the zoological community, confiscated Radiated Tortoises were offered to the Bronx Zoo from various sources. The largest group of these (30 animals) was sent from the Jersey Wildlife Propagation Trust (JWPT), and it is those animals which were doled out by the Bronx Zoo to various other US institutions which had expressed interest in trying to work with Radiated Tortoises. Honolulu Zoo and Riverbanks Zoo in SC each received small groups which began having breeding success after a few years.
Offspring from the St. Catherine's Island breeding group were sent over the years to many zoos and some dedicated private breeders as well. The SCSC facility was closed in October 2005 and all the tortoises (of many species by then) were moved to the newly constructed Behler Chelonian Center (BCC) in Ojai, CA which is managed by the Turtle Conservancy.
The Behler Chelonian Center was named in memory of my best friend, John Behler, who passed away in January 2006, only three months after the tortoises had arrived in CA. John was a forceful proponent of chelonian conservation and did everything in his power to help them avoid extinction. I miss John greatly!
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Thank you. What brought the interest was the dark coloration of specimens from that group vs many captive ones. I know part of that is likely related to some human selection, but there haven't been that many generations yet.
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Well, I have bred three generation of 100% CB Radiated Tortoises. That took about 40 years, and I was very careful to select my breeding animals for the coloration I desired.
I have also bred 3 generations of 100% CB Sri Lankan Stars which took about 20 years. It was easier to get the high yellow coloration in the Stars than in the Radiated Tortoises.
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Jan A
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There's a motel in Kansas with carpeting down the hallway that immediately reminded me of radiated tortoises.
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I have a theory that some of the difference in coloration between those early specimens (which were all WC animals) and the later CB animals may be due to the artificial incubation temperatures and a couple of other factors which are used for the eggs in captivity as compared to the actual nest temperatures in the wild.
Most people incubate Radiated Tortoise eggs at between 86F and 90F. A study of the actual temperatures within nests in the wild showed that the temperatures in the nests were pretty uniformly 73F for the entire incubation period and the in-situ eggs took much longer to hatch than the CB eggs. Wild nests took close to 9 months to hatch. Artificially incubated Radiated eggs take anywhere from about 90 to 110 days on the average.
This incubation temperature difference plus the selection of highly yellow captive specimens for breeding by humans are two differences that I can determine between the WC and CB animals. Humidity within the nests vs. humidity in artificial incubators is another possible factor in the color difference.
Additionally, it is doubtful from the study mentioned above that the wild eggs are ever subjected to temperatures as cool as those used by breeders prior to incubation of the eggs. I cooled many Radiated eggs at 54-64 degrees when I lived in CT. That may also be a factor in the difference in color.
Are you aware of a sex ratio difference among captive hatchlings at those temperatures, and of wild ones?
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I do know that way back in the 70's the eggs at St. Catherine's were incubated at 82, 84, and 86 degrees hoping for a good distribution of sexes in the young. All the babies turned out to be males, so the incubation temperatures were increased to 85, 87, and 89 which did produce both females and males. Remember that in order to tell the sexes of the offspring at that time, they had to be raised for about 8-10 years as there was no other way to sex them (other than euthanasia and dissection).
Has anyone ever incubated them at 73 in captivity? Is that an average nest temp for the 9 month duration of wild incubation, or is the actual temp inside the nest a constant 73 most of the time?
We are lucky to have you here Mr. Z. Thank you a million times over for sharing your knowledge and experience with us.
Interesting to consider natural selection as well. Perhaps in the wild, super colorful babies are easier to spot and therefore are predated more than the less colorful babies - thereby leading to a less colorful community.
I wish I could go see the natural habitat (im not doing international travel at this time), or find some decent video/photography of it. I'd assume it was grassland like from the patterning of captive animals, but I'm not sure as dark individuals would be an easier spot in a grassland environment I would believe.
This thread turned out to be informative, would love to see more tid bits like this, perhaps in a centralized thread. Lot of history and information our community will loose over time.
Jan A
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Not if members keep asking questions of our more experienced members. You obviously nailed your question. Thanks. That was interesting!!
TeamZissou
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There are lots of videos on Youtube of people doing conservation in Madagascar. Here's one that shows biologists installing trackers on tortoises in the spiny forest ecoregion where the tortoises occur.
Congrats on the torts! Most people don't realize how lucky they are to have breeders in their state.
Perhaps I should of worded that better, but thank you for the link. The videos on the conservation don't tend to focus on the habitat itself, and are generally (like this one) less than high quality video.
I was very fortunate, the breeder was moving out of state, in fact he left the day after I got them. The timing was unreal.
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Hi Tom,
As I understood it, 73 degrees was the constant temp in the nests for the 9 months. The researcher had expected the eggs to hatch more quickly and had used 6 month batteries in his sensing devices. The batteries died before the eggs hatched, so he had to switch over to one year batteries.
No one I know has ever tried incubating their eggs at that low a temperature. 82F is the lowest of which I am aware.
Thanks for the kind words. Just FYI, I am out of town for a week working in my dental office, so will be slower than usual to respond to questions, etc.
