A rescue aid

Just before thanksgiving a shipment from Democratic republic of Congo arrived in Florida for a scheduled importer. The shipment had been flagged as these specimens were smuggled across the border of Congo into the democratic republic of Congo. So naturally the shipment was confiscated. We were contacted by a partner zoo of us and decided to take these in. The holidays set them back a ways do they didn't get shipped to us útil the 1st week of December. 25 animals in total were received. We have lost only a single individual. Which is sad yes, but pretty good for this species as mortality is quite high.

So all of these are kinixys Erosa.
Many of them have tether holes in the shell in numerous places. Beautiful tortoises. They have all been placed into the studbook registry, hoping to show some captive breeding and success with this species.

We do plan on sending some of these to our west African colluege for captive breeding as well. Just need to get past some initial acclimation first.

Quite the tether holes in some specimens.

Some more pics

So sad what people, if that's what I have to call them, the forum doesn't allow the word I want to use, will do for money. Glad to see these got to you and not just disposed of or into the wrong hands that could try to save them.

tortadise said:

Quite the tether holes in some specimens.View attachment 196951

Some more pics
View attachment 196952

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They look really nice.
Be cool if you could get a breeding program going with these Kelly. How many males and females you got?

Anyfoot said:

They look really nice.
Be cool if you could get a breeding program going with these Kelly. How many males and females you got?

Click to expand...

I have not messed with them, the group is heavily identified as male though. They have entered into the studbook already. We get plenty of eggs from our erosa. The trick is hatching them. Which in my opinion is actually triggering the key to get them fertilized, more so hatching. Incubation is straight forward with these guys.

Kelly, do y'all do anything special during the acclimation process of these? As you've already mentioned, mortality is usually very high with many Kinixys species, so only losing 1 individual is very commendable.

Wow, what an interesting story! They're lucky they are with you.