Scientists raising threatened tortoises at a Mississippi National Guard camp to give them a head start in the wild are trying something new – raising a few to sexual maturity and then releasing them.
The Nature Conservancy and the National Guard released their first seven adult-sized gopher tortoises Wednesday at Camp Shelby, near Hattiesburg, where the nonprofit has a tortoise hatchery.
Reptile size and sexual maturity are closely related – and the animals were trying to mate and showed other signs of sexual maturity at age 5, project leader Jim Lee, a biologist with The Nature Conservancy, said in a phone interview Friday from Camp Shelby. He said five of the tortoises had been raised for six years but had shells about 10 inches (254 millimeters) long, or as big as those which have lived in Mississippi’s wilds for 18 to 25 years.
It’s an intriguing idea, said Tracey Tuberville, a University of Georgia scientist who runs a lab on the Savannah River near Aiken, South Carolina, and hadn’t heard of the latest twist at Camp Shelby.
“Assuming it’s successful, you’re basically providing an incredible boost to the population,” she said Friday. “You’re shading off a lot of years” to get adult animals.