NOFLAYE, Senegal — After a grueling trip by
air and road, several dozen endangered
African tortoises groggily poked their
heads out of their shells to take a look at their ancestral homeland.
اضافة اعلان
Forty-six tortoises born and raised in captivity in
Monaco have been brought to Senegal as a first step to returning to the wild.
They are African spurred tortoises — a species that
inhabits the southern rim of the Sahara.
Known by the
Latin name of Centrochelys sulcata, they are the world’s third-largest tortoise
species.
Some tortoises in captivity can weigh nearly 100km
and live as long as a century.
Listed as endangered by the International Union for
Conservation of Nature, the species is under pressure from trafficking and
overgrazing.
There are “at most” 150 African spurred tortoises
currently living in the wild in Senegal, said Tomas Diagne, director of the
African Chelonian Institute, a conservation group.
Within 30 years, they could die out, leaving only
specimens living as pets or in private breeding farms, he said.
“If I were a tortoise, I wouldn’t want to live or be
born in West Africa, or Africa, period,” he said.
The 46 tortoises that traveled from Monaco’s
Oceanographic Museum to the Tortoise Village of Noflaye, about 35km from
Senegal’s capital Dakar, are all youngsters — the oldest are only eight years
old.
Their parents -- six tortoises, which stayed behind
in Monaco — were a gift to Prince Albert II in 2011 from former Senegalese
president Amadou Toumani Toure.
After quarantine, the young tortoises will “learn
the ABCs” of life in the wild for a few months, said Diagne after their arrival
on Tuesday.
Once they have mastered survival skills like finding
their own food and digging out a burrow, they will be transferred to a nature
reserve to the northwest.
At first, they will live in a fenced-off area for
their protection. Later, the fence will be removed, and they will be on their
own.
“Fauna is always leaving Africa, always being
exported,” said Diagne. “It is very rare for it to come back.”
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