Army seeks to move more than 1,100 desert tortoises

 

As it prepares to expand training operations at Ft. Irwin in the Mojave Desert, the U.S. Army is again proposing to move more than 1,100 threatened California desert tortoises -- an unprecedented number of an endangered species that has not fared well during previous relocations.

 The Army is seeking the approval of the federal Bureau of Land Management to move the tortoises from nearly 100,000 acres in portions of the National Training Center to lands managed by the BLM. The environmental assessment is under BLM review and the proposed action is open for a 15-day public comment period.

Moving desert tortoises is not always successful. The Army relocated more than 600 of the animals last year but suspended the $8.7-million program after the first phase when officials noted high mortality rates among the tortoises, chiefly because of coyotes.

About 90 animals were found dead from suspected coyote predation. But Clarence Everly, natural and cultural resources program manager at Ft. Irwin, said only one animal died during the relocation.

The sheer numbers of tortoises proposed to be moved in this latest operation, beginning next spring through 2012, alarms conservationists.

"Nothing's ever been done on this scale before," said Ileene Anderson, a biologist with the Center for Biological Diversity, who says a total of 252 tortoises have died in the translocation area. "Every time the animals recognize that they don’t know where they are, they have some built-in mechanism that tells them to head for home and they make a break for home."

In the last move, some tortoises traveled up to five or six miles to get back to their home range, Anderson said.

The relocation of desert tortoises from Ft. Irwin, northeast of Barstow, to the drought-ravaged western Mojave puts more pressure on the species, whose population is already crashing, in part because of an upper respiratory disease that afflicts some animals. Everly said the Army is blood testing every tortoise and will quarantine any found to have the disease.
 
-- Julie Cart 

Photo: Desert tortoise. Credit: Rachel Wilson

Comments

[GT]

So what is the Army going to do? Have some bottom ranking twenty-something’s just drive through the desert and toss these turtles into a five ton Oshkosh and then drive them 30 or 40 miles away and dump them to fend for themselves? Relocation takes time and if the project is slated to start in 2012, one would expect such a relocation with proper habitat management to take three to five years. Why don't they just find someplace else to bomb and train?

[GM Owner]

Just combine Ft. Irwin and Twentynine Palms training facilities. To say that "bottom ranking twenty something's" would do something so callous just shows your absolute ignorance and disregard for military discipline. these highly trained soldiers are told that the tortoises have the right of way on the base.

My husband was stationed at Ft. Irwin and heard the warnings that if they should happen to come across the tortoises, they had to stop and wait for the animals to cross the road before proceeding. It was a punishable offense to touch the tortoise and move them so that the training may proceed quickly.

The animals were here long before the interloping humans and they'll be here long after we're gone, but I say that the BLM should closely monitor the transition so that the tortoises are kept alive and well for ALL to enjoy.

[Greg]

There's a lot of desert out there - I'm sure the army can find another place to bomb without disturbing these tortoises.

[lwps]

These creatures were there before the base, and we need the tortoises more than we need more bombs. This effort is doomed to failure, just on the face of it. Does nobody have any common sense anymore? Or is it always going to be one cover-your-butt rationalization after another from these deceitful sneaks?

[Karen Lee]

We are told that our army is "shrinking." WHY do we have to ENDANGER already ENDANGERED species? These creatures have inhabited this earth (in their space) since before the WHITE MAN arrived. WHATEVER the Army needs to do --FIND ANOTHER BASE (one of the MANY scheduled to CLOSE) to do WHATEVER the Army needs to do --THERE.

NO GOOD will come for these tortoises. LEAVE THEM BE. If God wanted these creatures in the MOJAVE -- he would have PUT THEM THERE!

Let the Army do "whatever" IN THE MOJAVE.

[trent smith]

this is nuts.....i thought this issue had been adressed already ...not only is this a protected species it is the state reptile....there has been documented mortality due to heavy equipment(tanks etc.)crushing their burrows......they hibernate in their burrows for a good part of the year and will virtually always return to their original burrows....plus the respiratory disease issue is no joke....if one infected individual is introduced to an uninfected colony(FOR INSTANCE THROUGH RELOCATION-)even inadvertantly it can easily WIPE OUT THE ENTIRE COLONY!!!!!!!!!!! Ye s these creatures are long lived but it takes a long time for them to reach sexual maturity and reproduce......A "kid gloves" approach would be way more appropriate in this case than "forced relocation" in my opiinion...By the way we have successfully raised and bred tortoises in captivity since the early 1970s.....Trent Smith

[Crystal]

Coming from the 29 Palms area, the tortoises should be left alone, they have a right to be there. It would take years for them to be able to relocate none the less adapt to a new area. It's not like they are humans who can live in different places.

[Judy]

The Army should train elsewhere and leave the turtles where they have been for thousands of years

[William Posey]

I lived 5 years in this part of the Mojave. We learned that just handling a desert tortoise can kill them, as the stress causes them to expel their liquids, resulting in rapid dehydration in a land where the soil temperature can be well over 100 degrees and the air so dry it sucks you dry in minutes. There are many military reserves in this region. It seems crazy that these army people feel they need THIS little piece of desert. I hope more people will find a way to oppose this.

[erik self]

...I do not think the army should move these creatures they should do without whatever they need this extra space for -- it may be wanted but we cant have it all....the army needs to preserve this area for the tortoises....please!

[will]

don't we already have a desert to bomb?

[crackbaby]

Slow and Steady gets the shaft

[Nicky G]

I have a brother who was posted out there, and they were very concerned about the tortoises. They can't just go somewhere else, Ft. Irwin IS the somewhere else. It wasn't pretty enough to be a National Park, and didn't have interesting name like "death valley". The army needs a place to train, and if they can relocate the tortoises they won't be endangering them.

[Nancy]

According to http://www.blm.gov/ca/st/en/info/newsroom/2009/february/CDD0921_translocation_comment_extension.html
the public comments closed in March 2009.
Why is more money going to be spent to blow more things up?

[T. Wheeler]

You did not post the url for making a comment to the BLM. Could you please post this link so readers can make a comment to the BLM, rather than the LA Times?

Thanks

[Mike Seltzer]

Some folks would be surpised to know that there are tortoises on Ft. Irwin that have been there since General Patton trained his troops for the invasion of North Africa in 1942.

[sheila]

are they hoping we all just forgot that they killed about half of the tortoises they moved last time? are they hoping we will somehow think waging more wars for oil is more important than preserving our natural ecosystems?

keep in mind that well over a million acres of this same desert is also under death threat for industrial solar and wind power plants (while none of us can get AB 811 loans to put solar panels on our roofs) and many if not most of the areas they want to dynamite, bulldoze, pave and industrialize out there are also good tortoise habitat (see Ivanpah, Chevron and BP's little project with Robert Kennedy, Jr., which will be a desert tortoise bloodbath).

ilene anderson knows what she is talking about - desert tortoise, like many other living beings, have a homing instinct. that should RULE OUT all tortoise relocations, period. mitigation and relocation are complete greenwashes. go do your stupid, destructive profiteering and killing-practice somewhere else. if you can't find a spot that won't slaughter a bunch of innocent species, then it's time to change your plans, not ruin yet another place.

[Ben Dover]

Once again Fort Irwin shows its total disregard for its requirements under the Endangered Species Act. In 1994 it took the threat of arrest of the commander of the base to get their attention on the protection of another endangered species on the base. Its really unfortunate that the last 8 years of the Bush abomination gave the military this attitude of they being above the law. At least now with an adult in the White House there is a chance the BA for this biological mistake will be written and interpreted honestly and the Army will be told to find other alternatives.

[nathan kilgore]

I sat for a talk by one of the state biologists on the subject of one of the other programs to relocate these animals. You would think there would be some common sense as to the results from this, but there just seems to be a reluctance on both sides to simply do the numbers.
Animals killed are dead no matter if its during relocation or from the resulting practice and mobilization.
Since there are several options, including navy controlled lands they could use, as well as less densly populated areas that was mentioned, better ideas need to be offered up before either the army or the conservationalists compromise.
I have friends that participated in excercises in the area and they really need the practice of moving heavy armor before they have to do it for real.
I also own and love my two liceinced desert tortoises.
I say talk smarter and talk more before acting.

[Joe]

"The animals were here long before the interloping humans and they'll be here long after we're gone, but I say that the BLM should closely monitor the transition so that the tortoises are kept alive and well for ALL to enjoy."

That's what they said about the Florida Panther, but thanks to humans there is no longer a true Florida Panther but rather a mix of panther and bobcat, and even then they are more bobcat than actual panther.

Why can't the Army look for some other training ground and just transport the trainees to it?

[John Johnston]

Who said anything about bombing--- much of the use on the NTC involves simply driving...It's pathetic when you have all the whining about "the army should go bomb something else" while more than likely your house is parked on what was once habitat for some poor species that had to move someplace else---or die. Pretty easy just to sit there slurping tofu, punching your keyboard and taking full advantage of an economy built on cheap energy, protected by a top notch military. Try to name another country whose Army would even CONSIDER habitat and species preservation on their training ranges. You're all right, maybe the Army should move its training range...into YOUR neighborhood. If you won't get off your widening postierior to either help tortise restoration and preservation or help the Army with this problem ---then YOU are the problem.

[Joseph]

The reason the Army can not look for some other training ground it that there is no other place in the United States that could fill in for Ft. Irwin. The very reason for its selection was its massive size, freedom from signal clutter, and its distance from major population centers.

[Jeremy]

Seems to me that theres a huge lack of compation for these poor creatures on the military side of the argument. Some one sitting at there desk high up in a building some where thinking, "Who cares about a couple of turdles". Its not right and if all problems where aprouched with such callis this would be a awfull country to live in. Thank god for the people that stand up for the right of those creatures that can't stand up for them selfs. Just the fact that there indangered I would think would be reason enough to not move them. What does it take classify a wild life reserve or somthing along those lines.

[Rick]

Only a fifteen day comment period? This makes it seem like the "fix" is in, the federal officials have already made up their minds, and there is little point in submitting comments. Despite "the change we can believe in", it appears that Army tank training continues to take precedence over threatened tortoises. It also sounds like past experience has shown that there is a high probability of high tortoise mortality from these translocations. I am reminded of the definition of insanity; doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. The Mojave desert is still subject to drought, expansion of invasive plants that cause devastating habitat loss through repeated fires, and the prospect of excessive raven and coyote predation on tortoises. Until we find a way to effectively reduce these overall, underlying threats to tortoises, and thereby begin to reverse the decline in their populations, these translocations should not occur.

[Marita Saxton]

It's a heartbreak. I love these little guys. I have a sulcata myself.

When I was growing up near Philadelphia, there were box turtles in the woods. They were very big. My dad said they were very old. As kids we used to play with them a little. One day, I went to the woods and there was a turtle someone had killed...smashed his body...on purpose. I wondered who would do a thing like that...I hoped it was no one that I knew and perhaps trusted. It was such a shock, as a child, to view such carnage and cruelty.

I wear a sea turtle on a chain around my neck. He's been hanging there for 20 years.

I wish the army would go elsewhere to train.