Guys,
The most commonly seen turtle in the wild seems to be the Red Eared Slider stemming back from releases in the eighties and nineties or at least that seems to be the case. Then the breeders bypassed the 1992 regulations and Yellow Bellies were then imported and now they are as frequently encounterwd as the RES in wild. Then more recently a new wave of imports again bypassing the regulations has seen a) Maps but not in big numbers, b)hybrids of Trachemys (Sliders) in big numbers and c) Pseudemys (Cooter) of various kinds, Pc concina and Pc floridana being most frequently seen. I have seen hybrids of all of these animals so ID is academic. I have most of these variations in my own pond outside. In my opinion the Sliders are not nearly as hardy as the Cooters and I will not be surprised that with time the River Cooter will be the animal most likely to survive illegal release into ponds. Most released animals die. In my own county of Somerset I know the local Reptile clubs, the water Authorities etc and do ask about Chelonia in the wild the answer is a universal blank. Whilst there is much verbalisation on the wild animals everytime I have investigated I have also drawn blanks. In my county I seen evidence of one release in the last five years. I ended up with that animal - a YBS which died in a matter of days with significant respirotary and eye problems.
In a number of dealings on the subject a WAG leads toward a number of low thousands in the whole of the UK, most in conurbations, but numbers fluctuate. Risk assessment has shown that these animals pose little real threat to UK flora and Fauna. Today in my ponds I have all 3 species of newt, frogs and common taod breedoing and co-existing.
Yesterday in my Spotted pond I had palmate newts going through breeding dances just inches from the turtles.
Please in these debates dont dwell on the threat from releases, it is important and it is illegal but not the real issue. The real issue for me personally is that hundreds of thousands of animals die a nasty death due to mindless selling and mindless buying.
Rom
PS My own Cooters are up after hibernation and trying to find the sun.
You can see cooters YBS and RES here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-B2t5X4CHk