ALLEN SALZBERG: New York State Snapping Turtles Under Attack

Speaker Silver is receiving  emails and calls to defeat the  turtle bill and still reviewing the bill , now please take this opportunity to present your own NYS legislator with the facts too.

Tell your assemblyman to vote against A2490, a bill that legalizes the capture and killing of snapping turtles by trapping. A bill that is speeding through the  NYS Legislature.  

Snapping turtles are already permitted to be killed by gun and longbow and therefore recreational and commercial trapping will dramatically increase the number of  these turtles deaths. A devastating blow to these  vulnerable animals.   The bill has passed the Senate is and  is currently in the Assembly Codes Committee. This proposed legislation is cruel and scientifically wrong.  It is not based on any proven science regarding snapping turtles, or any turtle species.  

So please contact your Assemblymember.

Please take one minute to  ask  your own  NYS level Assemblymember to vote no on A2490.

To Locate the name  and contact page of your Assemblymember  go to:

1.       http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/?sh=search

2.       Fill in your address

3.       Click on your Assemblymember’s  name

4.       Click on the  Assemblymember’s CONTACT  page and write your email and/or  call.

If you  know your legislators name and wish to call the Albany office -- 518-455-4100.  ( Assembly operator)

If you have time you may wish to add  the following points:

1.    The flesh of snapping turtles is tainted with toxins .

2.    Non- intended endangered and threatened species of turtles will be captured and killed if this bill if passed. Ie:the  Endangered Bog Turtle and  the Threatened  Blanding’s turtle.  

1.      Turtles are already  vulnerable to an existing  multitude of threats such as loss of habitat,  mortality rates of pregnant females crossing roadways, high  hatchling  death rates etc. Killing snapping turtles by traps will only increase their population loss. They need to be protected, not killed.        

2.   What sort of state passes laws to make it easy to eat their state reptile, the common snapping turtle?

For those wanting to see a copy of the bill, A2490, email me at asalzberg@herpdigest.org.

Thanks. Please do it. 

Allen Salzberg

Publisher/Editor

HerpDigest:The Only Free Internet-Only Weekly Newslettter that Reports on the Latest Reptile and Amphibian Scientific and Conservation News 

Go to www.herpdigest.org to subscribe

Committee Chair Conservation & Media Committees New York Turtle & Tortoise Society

Member of the IUCN Species Survival Group for Tortoises and Fresh Water Turtles