ANNISTON, Ala. - Box turtles are known for their lethargic pace and tough shells. But lately the Alabama-native reptiles are becoming a fast-moving commodity on an illegal black market. Experts say the animals are going to need more than shells to protect themselves from unlawful turtle-catchers.
Lt. Michael Bloxom is an Alabama Wildlife and Freshwater Fisheries Division officer who is designated to help them.
He spends part of every work day looking for turtles, deer, snakes and other Alabama animals for sale on the Internet.
Recently, his efforts paid off, leading to the arrest of two couples in Wedowee.
According to Randolph County Assistant District Attorney Amy Newsome, Porsha and Wayne Price and Daniel and Rebecca Smith of Wedowee were arrested and convicted of possessing protected animals for sale earlier in July.
Police say the four had been selling endangered eastern box turtles online and mailing them to buyers around the country and possibly abroad.
The two couples had no connection to each other that police can find and claimed they did not know selling the turtles is illegal.
All four spent a short time in jail before being released to 24 months of probation, paying $100 fines and forfeiting money they earned in the sales.
The two Wedowee couples are not the only people involved in the illegal capture and sale of turtles in Alabama.
Bloxom said eastern box turtles mostly are being sold as pets at flea markets or shipped to "turtle farms" in Louisiana and Arkansas.
Farmers who want to breed the reptiles pick up other turtles.
Some farmers breed turtles to sell the eggs or hatchlings as pets, Bloxom said.
Others breed the turtles for food.
In Louisiana and parts of Asia, Bloxom said, farmers inject the turtles with hormones and slaughter them like chickens every year. Turtles are a traditional source of meat in Cajun cuisine.
"Within a year they've got an eating-sized turtle," Bloxom said.
For the farmers, capturing turtles in the wild makes economic sense.
"When you want to start a turtle farm, where do you start?" Bloxom asked. "You can get these little hatchlings and wait five or 10 years for them to mature or go into the wild and catch some breeding-sized turtles."
But turtle catching can create a strain on the environment, especially when the turtles are endangered like the box turtles, which have been on the federal endangered species list since 1973.
Bloxom said that in the late 1990s the number of turtles in Weiss Lake declined dramatically because of turtle-catchers.
Turtle populations haven't recovered, Bloxom said.
State lawmakers set a catch limit of 10 turtles per day after seeing the declining numbers in Weiss Lake.
Turtles can provide an important part of the ecosystems where they live, eating insects and decaying organic material, said Kevin Jenne, a biologist at the Anniston Museum of Natural History.
"They're another link in the food chain," he said. "If you get rid of them, there may be too many worms here or too many bugs there."
Said Bloxom: "Just think if everyone thought 'Hey I can get on the computer and make a hundred bucks a turtle.' There wouldn't be any turtles left."
Jenne said the reptile trade took off in the 1990s and has not slowed since.
Snakes and lizards have been imported into the U.S. from all over the world, leaving other areas with greatly reduced numbers of indigenous animals.
"If something becomes a fad, some local will say 'Hey I can make some money off of this' and go catch and sell native animals," Jenne said.
Turtle catchers typically bait partially submerged boxes or small, round fishing nets with dead fish and collect the turtles.
Once the turtles are caught, they usually are placed in burlap sacks with 30 or 40 other turtles and put on trucks to be hauled as far away as Arkansas.
"When you get them in there in June or July, it becomes like an oven in there for them," Bloxom said.
Box turtles first were placed on the federal list of endangered species in 1973 because the numbers of young turtles being found was lower than expected. Since turtles often live much longer than humans, the plentiful numbers of adults still may be seen in 20 years.
But when that generation dies out, biologists like Jenne fear the younger turtles may not be able to replace them.
All turtles have a "4-inch rule," Jenne said.
Turtles whose shells are less than 4 inches around cannot be bought or sold. This is to protect turtles that have not reached sexual maturity, Jenne added.
Bloxom said box turtles are not the first species in Alabama that the demands of the retail market have threatened.
In the 1990s freshwater mussels, which can be used for the production of cultured pearls and paddlefish, sought for their caviar, were in such high demand that laws were passed to keep the species from being wiped out.
Recently, Bloxom and his agents have learned of truckloads of bullfrogs and crawfish being shipped out of the state.
"That's not illegal, but it's our job to find out if that is going to cause a problem," he said.
Even deer have become a popular export for some traffickers.
People in neighboring states will pay good money for live deer to stock their hunting reserves, Bloxom said.
"We may be worrying about turtles today and deer tomorrow," he said.
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