File:Atoll research bulletin (1967) (20159131359).jpg

Title: Atoll research bulletin
Identifier: atollresearchbu181271smit (find matches)
Year: 1951 (1950s)
Authors: Smithsonian Institution. Press; National Research Council (U. S. ). Pacific Science Board; Smithsonian Institution; National Museum of Natural History (U. S. ); United States. Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife
Subjects: Coral reefs and islands; Marine biology; Marine sciences
Publisher: Washington, D. C. : (Smithsonian Press)
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Biodiversity Heritage Library

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-20'S Figure 5.—Distribution of giant land tortoise in the eighteenth century in the Indian Ocean, after Rothschild (1915) Coppinger in 1882 found seven giant tortoises imported from Aldabra roaming in the woodland on Providence (Coppinger 1883, 234). Nor can we find any rec- ord of wild populations in the Chagos Archipelago. These records are there- fore marked as doubtful in Figure 5. The case of Providence is an example of the manner in which, as described by Rothschild, domestic herds were re- cruited from many different islands, and how transfer of wild tortoise took place from one island to another, thus making any detailed study of original variation impossible. Some of the Seychelles domestic tortoises, of unknown provenance, were released, for example, on the north and west islands of Aldabra (Rothschild 1915, 433). The massive decline in tortoise numbers in the Malagasy Region seems to have resulted from many factors. Direct predation by man for food seems to have been considerable. Sauzier (1893) records exports from the Seychelles and Mauritius of more than 3000 tortoises in 1826, for example, and in 1847 two ships took 1200 tortoises from Aldabra alone (Rothschild 1915, 424; Voeltzkow 1897, 59; Parsons 1962 wrongly states that the animals were turtles). This trade was probably episodic; but with such a long-lived animal

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