Last section of this important paper written by Dr Barbara Maas:
Public and Environmental Health Implications
Farmed turtles are likely to carry Salmonella. Infected individuals can only be identified by using laboratory tests. Salmonella infections from reptiles have been associated with severe health problems and death and pose a serious contamination risk and human health hazard in a food retail environment. Experts agree that due to the quantities of animals involved in commercial turtle farming for food, the idea of producing salmonella-free hatchlings or adults is unrealistic.
The same is true for diseases introduced through the importation of frogs, lizards, snakes and salamanders. In the case of frogs, for example, farmers and retailers routinely use bleach on the animals in an attempt to combat germs, which is highly inappropriate in terms of animal welfare and public health. It is also ineffective.
Turtle farming has transferred recognised harmful intensive farming practices to mass breeding of wild animals. Soft-shell turtles are not group living animals. Both sexes are territorial and highly aggressive. Even hatchlings at farms often kill each other after two days. High density rearing fails to take account of natural group size and/or group composition (e.g., 1 male with 100 females). Forced proximity, overcrowding, food and mate competition etc. are recognised biological stressors that affect the animals’ health, welfare, and reproductive potential and result in cannibalism, injuries and disease. These circumstances also provide ideal conditions for disease outbreaks, higher contact rates, aggression, compromised immune response, and unnatural pathogen and parasite loads. The explosive outbreaks of SARS and mad cow disease are just two examples of the potential consequences of this approach.
Individual Pelodiscus sinensis reach saleable weight about two years after hatching and become sexually mature aged between 4-5 years old in the wild. Farmers seek to accelerate growth by using growth hormones and by rearing turtles under permanent light and in heated water, which makes turtles more aggressive, raises contact rate and so further exacerbates disease related problems. Farms then attempt to minimize the effects of what are essentially biological symptoms of unsuitable conditions, by using harmful chemical water and food additives, including and antibiotics. The need to restock with fresh animals for breeding purposes is another side effect (see above). To avoid triggering aggression and stress in turtles requires not only visual but olfactory separation, which cannot be achieved under commercial farming conditions.
Keeping Turtles on Ice
Pelodiscus sinensis is a tropical species which requires normal ambient temperatures between 22-24°C and basking temperatures upwards of 30°C. Placing these animals on ice (2-4°C) is therefore unacceptable from a veterinary and animal welfare point of view and will be associated with pain, distress and clinical stress as a result of hypothermia.
A Final Word from Professor Shi
Asia has a high diversity of turtle species, but this unique fauna is facing a perilous and uncertain future. The Chinese turtle trade is the primary threat to endangered turtle populations throughout Asia, primarily because of the long tradition of consuming turtles in China. This demand is fuelled by deeply held cultural beliefs and threatens all of Asia’s turtles. In China, turtles are a sought after delicacy because of the widespread popular belief, inspired by Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), that turtle meat and shell possess special nutritional or curative properties.
The large-scale consumption of turtle products results, in part, from false claims about the nutritional value of turtles. Combating a faith-based misconception with science is an uphill endeavour. Practitioners of TCM do not attempt to test the veracity of their claims. As a result, almost all of their recommendations lack an empirical and rational foundation. Nevertheless, turtle jelly, made from the ground-up shells of endangered species, has become popular in Hong Kong and several chain stores specializing in this expensive “health food” have opened in the past decade. Our study shows that, where nutritional composition and content are concerned, the human consumption of turtles could and should be completely substituted by other, often cheaper domestic sources and mineral supplements. All of these are widely available in China nowadays, particularly to those able to afford consuming turtles.
This demand has fuelled a highly profitable captive breeding industry that contributes to the ongoing extirpation of China’s wild turtle populations and is used to sanitise this damaging trade.
Almost every species is traded; only a very few Asian turtle species have not been reported in trade. These species are exceptionally rare and in some cases probably extinct. There are approximately 30 indigenous turtle species in China of which three are already presumed extinct. Once extremely common and widespread species, such as Mauremys reevesii and Pelodiscus sinensis are now also very difficult to find in the field, while Cuora trifasciata is critically endangered. However, they still face intense and targeted harvesting pressure.
All of China’s turtle and tortoise species are endangered as a result of human consumption. Turtle consumption in China is unsustainable with or without farming – and has led to the depletion of wild turtle populations across Asia and beyond.
Our research shows that the same (or better) nutritional benefits can be obtained with cheaper, more commonly available, and less-endangered food sources. Given the financial and environmental costs of eating turtles, other options for obtaining the same nutrition should be promoted instead.
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