October 2014

Pig-nosed turtles have a face that only a mother could love, but that doesn’t stop hundreds of thousands of the rare reptiles from being illegally traded around the world every year. According to a new report from TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, as many as 2 million pig-nosed turtle eggs are illegally collected from the wild each year so the reptiles can be grown in captivity and then sold as exotic pets or meat. Many are ground up for use in traditional medicine in China and Hong Kong.

Pig-nosed turtles, which are considered vulnerable to extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, are the sole remaining species in their taxonomic family. Native to northern Australia and the island of New Guinea, the turtles have large nostrils at the end of their fleshy snout, the origin of their name. They are also the only freshwater turtle species to use flippers instead of feet.

Export and import of the species are heavily regulated under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, but this hasn’t been enough to protect the animals, according to TRAFFIC. The sheer number of turtles rescued from smugglers illustrates the point: More than 11,000 newborn turtles were confiscated in Indonesia and Hong Kong in January alone.

TRAFFIC’s investigation found that foreign traders pay Papuan villagers to collect eggs by the thousands from the island’s rivers and swamps. The eggs are then stored in hatcheries.

One informant told TRAFFIC that “five local traders in the area were incubating 3,000 to 5,000 eggs each.” Another told the organization his village collected 50,000 to 60,000 eggs every year. The traders pay as little as 11 cents for eggs and up to $1.33 for hatchlings, although sometimes they trade large numbers of turtles and eggs for “modern commodities” and provisions such as outboard boat motors and fuel (which in turn help villagers to collect more eggs). Prices go up as the turtles travel through several middlemen.

Eventually they reach mainland China, where they sell for $28 to $39. Buyers keep them as pets, eat them, or grind them into a powder for use in traditional Asian medicine. Hard-shell turtles are used in traditional Chinese medicine to “treat” conditions ranging from fever to skin blemishes and for “replenishing vital essence.” None of these treatments is supported by science.

All of this collection and trade is banned by international law and laws in each country where the turtles live, but local enforcement in Papua is almost nonexistent, TRAFFIC found.

“Urgent enforcement action in Papua province targeting middlemen operating in rural communities is needed,” TRAFFIC regional director Chris Shepherd said in a statement.

TRAFFIC is also calling for increased monitoring at ports in Indonesia and other countries, as well as community-awareness programs and economic initiatives to encourage villagers to stop collecting the eggs.

The most important step, according to the report’s authors, is to find ways to reduce the numbers of consumers seeking out pig-nosed turtles.

“Without mitigation of the high demands of consumer nations,” they write, “illegal over-exploitation will continue to be a serious threat to this unique species.”

A pig-nosed turtle, which is becoming a favorite as an exotic pet.

They aren’t teenaged, mutant or ninja-like, but pig-nosed turtles are still pretty cute.

The unique freshwater turtles have pig-like snouts and flippers like marine turtles, and their cuteness has made them popular as pets. But that’s created a black market industry of turtle smuggling.

According to a newly-released report by Traffic, an international watchdog group that monitors the wildlife trade, the pig-nosed turtle is under threat from exotic pet traders. The new report on the state of the species finds that between 2003 and 2013, more than 80,000 of the turtles were confiscated in 30 seizures. That includes a massive bust of 8,368 turtles found smuggled inside suitcases in Papua New Guinea and Indonesia in January 2013.

But those seizures are only a slice of the overall market: “It’s a little bit like the drug trade,” says Eric Goode, the president of the Turtle Conservancy. “They probably apprehend or find five to 10 percent of [pig-nosed turtles] going through airports.”” The illegal animal trade as a whole constitutes an estimated $10 billion global industry, according to the Humane Society.

Smuggled animals are usually transported as babies thanks to their smaller size, and that’s when the pig-nosed turtles at their cutest. But buyers don’t think about what happens when the turtles grow up, Goode says.

“Like many pets, the cute factor is extremely cute — when they’re little,” Goode says. “But [pig-nosed turtles] grow up to be quite large and aggressive with one another, and they need a very large aquarium or pond with very warm water.”

In fact, they can grow up to 50 pounds and two feet in length over the course of their 40-year lifespan.

“So somebody sees one in a tank, it’s this adorable little turtle, nearly four inches long, and thinks ‘Wow, I can keep this incredible, rubbery, cute little thing’”, says Goode. “And you know, if they keep it long enough, it gets large and it becomes this disposable pet and they give it away or it dies or they throw it away.”

And that’s a big problem for the pig-nosed turtle, which is already on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

In the US, the turtle was almost unknown for a long time. “The Bronx Zoo had an animal which they still have today, he’s called Freddy and he’s the only pig-nosed turtle in the US that anyone knew about — so it was kind of the Holy Grail,” Goode xplains. “It was the most bizarre and odd-looking turtle … But in the last 10-15 years they did start coming into the United States in bigger numbers — mostly smuggled.”

Pig-nosed turtles are indigenous to Australia and Papua New Guinea but most of the turtle smuggling industry is based in the latter country.

“The local people collect the eggs on the banks of these big rivers, and they can collect literally thousands of them and distribute them,” Goode says. “And with the newfound wealth of Asia, there is a very, very large market in recent years.”

Source: www.theworld.org

The pig-nosed turtle is a wonderful evolutionary mash-up: a fleshy snout with porcine nostrils, a soft shell and, unusual for a freshwater turtle, long webbed flippers. But the turtles’ unique characteristics means, unfortunately, these vulnerable reptiles have found themselves in the crosshairs of the illegal international wildlife trade.

A pig-nosed turtle may seem cute, but demand for pet turtles and folk medicine is driving down their population in places like Papua, Indonesia. Wildlife trade monitoring group TRAFFIC reports that local residents collect as many as 2 million wild turtle eggs each year – illegally – and then sell the hatchlings, as the turtles are difficult to breed in captivity.

Traditionally, pig-nosed turtles were a food supply to these groups, but, according to TRAFFIC, wildlife traders have begun offering monetary rewards in exchange for juvenile turtles.

Pig-nosed turtles have only left Indonesia legally once, with 57 turtles destined for the U.S. in 2006, TRAFFIC reports. It’s much cheaper to attempt to smuggle the turtles across international borders. In the previous decade, busts have recaptured 80,000 turtles, with a staggering 12,247 reptiles found in a single seizure. The turtles, often juveniles kept in suitcases, perish at a rate of about one in five during transit.

In 2011, Australian biologist Carla Eisemberg at the University of Canberra called for the establishment of local programs that encourage the protection of these turtles while respecting the needs of human populations to collect food.

Source : thedodo.com