Amystery diseasehas sweep up through the Bellinger River turtle ’s habitat , pushing the species to the brink of extinguishing . The unidentified pathogen , which has a 100 % fatality rate charge per unit , has left scientists in the area shell - shocked . They ’ve deal to economise just over a dozen individual , now in enslavement , and trust that more might subsist out in the wild , but right now it ’s not looking good .
The Bellinger River snapping turtleneck ( Myuchelys georgesi ) only experience in the river from which it takes its name , located in New South Wales , Australia . Previously of little preservation concern , since people first began to mark that something was up just a few months ago , the universe has go down by around 90 % . Scientists from theUniversity of Western Sydneyhave managed to find 17 ostensibly levelheaded individuals and have aim them into quarantine in the Bob Hope of starting acaptive breedingprogram .
“ There ’s a real possible action they ’ll become nonextant , which is a tragedy really , ” DrRicky Spencer , a animal scientist at the University of Western Sydney toldThe Guardian . “ For this to fall out over the period of a month is very alarming . [ … ] It may take years before we find out what ’s happened here . What we do know is that it wipe out and it shoot down rapidly . Within a month , the turtle have gone from not threatened to endanger or critically peril . ”
Dr. Ricky Spencer holding one of the turtles . Sally Tsoutas / University of Western Sydney
Alongside causing the animals to become lethargic , the unpleasant disease result in the formation of lesions both inside interior variety meat and around their eyes , finally causing them to go unreasoning and break of starvation . Since mid - February , over 400 dead or fail turtleneck have washed up on the bank building of the river , prompting a major reaction from the authorities , who set up a wildlife biosecurity team to seek to bound the spread of the disease . But with no one sure of exactly what has caused the deaths , it might be that the only Leslie Townes Hope lies with the few who are shell - tered in captivity .
The unprecedented decay announced on World Turtle Day is a sobering admonisher of the shaky edge on which many turtleneck species rest . The International Union for Conservation of Nature ( IUCN ) estimates that62 % of turtle speciesare at risk of defunctness .
