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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBLM to kill hundreds of desert tortoises as its conservation center runs out of money
http://www.kingsnake.com/blog/index.php?url=archives%2F1561-BLM-to-kill-hundreds-of-desert-tortoises-as-its-conservation-center-runs-out-of-money.html&serendipity[csuccess]=trueThe U.S. Bureau of Land Management announced it will kill hundreds of threatened desert tortoises it's been caring for at a Nevada conservation facility. The slaughter is being blamed on a lack of funds by the agency.
Real estate developers in southern Nevada who wanted to disrupt the habitat of threatened desert tortoises to build their little enclaves of air conditioning and irrigation in the arid suburbs of Las Vegas have been able to do so -- for a fee. And while at the height of the real estate boom those fees went a long way toward providing refuge for displaced tortoises, the real estate bust has seen the program implode.
From the Washington Post:
Federal funds are running out at the Desert Tortoise Conservation Center and officials plan to close the site and euthanize hundreds of the tortoises theyve been caring for since the animals were added to the endangered species list in 1990.
(A tad more at the link. Via Idle No More.)
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)shenmue
(38,506 posts)This is awful. Can't they adopt them out to other sanctuaries? Consarnit, why kill them?
CaliforniaPeggy
(149,525 posts)Surely there is a better solution.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)When I was stationed at 29 Palms the joke was they were so protected you had to salute them when you passed them.
They're cute little guys, though, and the mascot of several Marine armor units.
Politicalboi
(15,189 posts)How stupid to kill them all. When I was a kid we had a few of these in our yard. I think we had 3 females and one male. His front feet hardly ever touched the ground during mating season.
Vanje
(9,766 posts)under the endangered species act? Federal agencies are not exempt.
xxqqqzme
(14,887 posts)solution, they really cannot be named 'Land Management'. So gas all of them and shove 'em in a ditch is their best answer?
Phlem
(6,323 posts)leaving them alone costs how much?
-p
defacto7
(13,485 posts)I would take one myself. My kids would love it. I had a tortoise when I was a kid and it was a great learning experience. My kids would be totally into this. We also live in a desert climate so it would be the right place.
Joe Shlabotnik
(5,604 posts)The tortoises lost their habitat due to unsustainable development, and then their very lives depend on funding from this unsustainable development. More lofty market friendly solutions.
Raine
(30,540 posts)and doesn't even take that much care. My tortoise sleeps more than half the year, I really love him. The thought of them killing them makes me just sick.