It seems some jerk scientists have stumbled across my private stash of Swinhoe’s turtles and are now hailing their rediscovery. These are my private stash! I’m saving them for a special experiment, but now I have to deal with some conservation nutjobs who haven’t figures out how to mass clone endangered animals. For shame! If I don’t save the wee turtles, who will?

Almost Extinct Turtle Discovered Living In Wild In Northern Vietnam

ScienceDaily (Apr. 19, 2008) — “Swinhoe’s soft-shell turtle” was thought to be extinct in nature. Cleveland Metroparks Zoo has just announced the discovery of a critically endangered turtle in northern Vietnam that previously was thought to be extinct in the wild. Experts from the Zoo’s Asian Turtle Program confirmed that they have identified the only known living specimen of a Swinhoe’s soft-shell turtle (Rafetus swinhoei) in nature.

After three years of searching lakes and wetlands along the Red River in northern Vietnam, researchers sponsored by Cleveland Metroparks Zoo and the Cleveland Zoological Society, turned their focus to a lake just west of Hanoi, where local residents claimed to have occasionally seen the gigantic soft-shell turtle. Field biologist Nguyen Xuan Thuan, with Education for Nature in Vietnam, found and photographed the turtle as it basked on the lake’s surface, allowing scientists to confirm the animal was the extremely rare Swinhoe’s turtle.

This is an incredibly important discovery because the Swinhoe’s turtle is one of the most critically endangered species of turtle in the world,” said Doug Hendrie, the Vietnam-based coordinator of Cleveland Metroparks Zoo’s Asian Turtle Program. “This species has legendary status among the people of Vietnam, so this is perhaps an opportunity for the legend to live on.”