5/6/2023 0 Comments C9 sneaky ninja turtleA ban on commercial harvest is needed to fully protect turtles, and the potential health risks of consuming turtles contaminated with toxins need to be addressed.” “However, lax limits and exemptions will be exploited by commercial harvesters profitably exporting turtles to Asia. “Georgia’s previous wildlife laws treated native turtles not protected by state or federal law as no better than pests, so this is an improvement,” said Miller. The Southeast became a hotspot of turtle harvest due to large turtle diversity and lack of state regulations on harvest. This unsustainable harvest is rapidly depleting native turtle populations already suffering from other threats like habitat loss, water pollution and road mortality. Adult turtles are also taken from the wild to breed hatchlings for the international pet trade. Turtles sold as food can be contaminated with mercury, PCBs, and pesticides. Turtle traders in the United States catch and export more than 2 million wild-caught freshwater turtles each year, mostly to supply food and medicinal markets in Asia, where soaring turtle consumption rates have decimated the native turtles. “The new regulations are a welcome step but don’t go far enough to protect wild turtles, since the harvest limits are far above what’s sustainable.” “Georgia is clamping down on the unrestrained strip-mining of native turtles to supply food markets in Asia,” said Jeff Miller, a conservation advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity, which in 2008 sought a ban on commercial turtle collecting in Florida, Georgia, Oklahoma and Texas. The new rules help address population declines of native southern turtle populations caused by unregulated harvest and export for international food markets. Georgia had been the only state in the Southeast without limitations on harvest or regulations on the export, farming and sale of native freshwater turtles. New Regs Still Don't Go Far Enough to Safeguard Wild Turtle PopulationsĪTLANTA- The Georgia Department of Natural Resources Board of Directors today unanimously approved its first-ever state rules regulating the commercial collection of wild freshwater turtles. Georgia Reins In Harvest of Freshwater Turtles
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