Saving turtles

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1999:

Indifference on the part of the
Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commission
didn’t deter Marianne Allen, animal
abuse director for the Sunshine Ranches
Homeowners Association, after resident
Sharon Armellini reported spotting a turtle
trapper in action. Allen recently led a sweep of
community waterways that freed 25 turtles
from traps and found 10 others who had died in
traps. Trapping and exporting Florida softshell
turtles to Asia and Asian-style markets elsewhere
in the U.S. remains legal, despite a
recent global crash in turtle populations,
caused mainly by human consumption.

Public works employees in Port St.
L u c i e, Florida, told Sandy Carl that they
couldn’t descend from their canal brush-clearing
machine to look for protected gopher tortoises
because of the potential risk of encountering
a deadly snake––so Carl found and
flagged several dozen gopher tortoise burrows
herself, and dug out two others that the equipment
had already bured, Teresa Lane of the
Palm Beach Post reported in May.
Leslie Ganss, of Eagleswood, New
Jersey, recently posted her own signs warning
drivers about turtle crossings, inspiring the
town to put up their own. “Motorists have
begun to pay attention,” reported M i c h a e l
Amsel of the Asbury Park Press on June 28