US freshwater turtles near extinction
TUCSON, Arizona, March 11, 2009 (ENS) – Conservation and health groups today filed emergency petitions with eight midwestern and southern states, seeking to end the commercial harvest of freshwater turtles sold for food in the United States and abroad. Not only are the turtles vanishing into extinction, but consumers are eating meat from turtles caught in streams contaminated with mercury, polychlorinated biphenyls, and pesticides, the petitioners warn. The coalition of two dozen groups submitted administrative petitions to state wildlife and health agencies in Arkansas, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Ohio, South Carolina, and Tennessee, asking for a ban on commercial harvest of freshwater turtles in all public and private waters. The groups say wildlife exporters and dealers are harvesting massive and unsustainable numbers of wild freshwater turtles from southern and midwestern states that continue to allow unlimited and unregulated take of turtles. "Unregulated wildlife dealers are mining southern and midwestern streams for turtles for the export trade, in a frenzy reminiscent of the gold rush," said Jeff Miller, conservation advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity. … The few turtle surveys that have been conducted in southern and midwestern states show depletions and extinction of freshwater turtles in many streams. Herpetologists have reported drastic reductions in numbers and even the disappearance of many southern map turtle species. …
