The Bolson Tortoise project was featured on NPR’s 90 Second Naturalist podcast, which provides a daily glimpse into the natural world from Thane Maynard, President of the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden.
The largest and rarest of the five North American tortoise species, the bolson tortoise is thought to have once lived throughout most of the Chihuahuan desert, but its current range is restricted to a small area in north central Mexico where the states of Durango, Chihuahua, and Coahuila meet. In an effort to prevent the species’ extinction, TESF is working towards establishing free-ranging bolson tortoise populations on the Ladder and Armendaris Ranches in New Mexico, which lie at the northern tip of the tortoise’s prehistoric range. In May 2017, Turner released the first captive-born Bolson Tortoises in the United States, 10 to 15 thousand years after they disappeared from the area.