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New information about wild sulcatas.


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Posted by J.M. on August 04, 2000 at 14:05:37:

I've just received a monographic about the sulcata writed by Bernard Devaux and published by SOPTOM in association with the European Union.

There are a few very interesting points that I would to share with you and hear of your opinion (my main language is spanish, so excuse my telegraphic english).

- Food intake: Meat (carrion) is more often consumed by sulcatas in the wild than suspected.

- Sulcata due to overcollected in recent years is now becoming very rare and severely threatened. The CITES org refused to put it in appendix I (good IMO becouse sometimes CITES is a real handicap to breeding programs in captivity, with the tortoise in appendix II is quite difficult to move tortoises between America and Europe, with those in the appendix I near imposible, even for zoos and institutions).

The export quota allowed for this tortoise in Africa is zero. (very good IMHO becouse of the endangered status of the tortoise and becouse tortoises breeding in captivity are more than enough for supply the demand)

- Tortoises in the wild are very parasite and disease free. (Is very hard to believe for me, having working with some very problematic wild caught pardalis, but...)

- Sulcata Tortoises have a morphologic and genetic uniformity trought its range from Mauritania to Erytrea. This is due to the continous translocation of specimens by men. (some tortoise keepers from USA said to me that those from East africa are more dark and elongated).

- Pyramiding: not referred but wild sulcata photos appear to be very smooth.

- Scute aberrations: 8% of the newborn sulcatas have scute aberrations in the dorsal part.

(....)

There are a breeding facility now in Senegal and some reintroduction programs, I have offered my collaboration to those and I think that it could be a good destination for some of the unwanted tortoises that could appear in the american and european markets. Anyway, reintroduction is not always as easy as suspected, there are a lot of problems, from veterinarian, (diseases, parasites..), behavioral, habitats, etc.


Regards,

Juan - Canary Islands


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