It also helps to replicate that success to save other species. The race to save this flagship species in Ha Noi highlights the importance of working in partnership to mobilize resources and address issues like water pollution, safer habitat, and more sustainable resource management. Ultimately, conservationists aim to help at least one male and female to breed to ensure that this species can return from the brink of extinction. Conservationists hope to capture and determine the sex of the other turtles in the coming months. Authorities believe there are at least one more of these turtles in Dong Mo Lake and another in nearby Xuan Khanh Lake.
The confirmation of Swinhoe’s softshell turtle in Ha Noi’s Dong Mo Lake means there is now a female in addition to a male, who is at the Suzhou Zoo in China. With the leadership of the Ha Noi Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, in collaboration with the Asian Turtle Program of Indo-Myanmar Conservation and our organization, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), this imperiled turtle species may now have a second chance at survival. Then, in October 2020, a female turtle was captured in Viet Nam and confirmed by veterinarians to be a female Rafetus swinhoei. Swinhoe’s softshell turtles were also included in the five-year conservation plan of Ha Noi People’s Committee in 2018 and added to the committee’s 2030 vision plan. In response, conservationists and veterinary experts from Viet Nam, along with global partners, made the recovery of this turtle one of their highest priorities. When two of the last remaining Swinhoe’s softshell turtles died without producing any known offspring between 2016 and 2019, this species became the most endangered turtle in the world. Since 2013, the Rafetus swinhoei has also been listed in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. For two decades it has been listed as “ Critically Endangered” on the Red List maintained by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The lake was renamed Hoan Kiem Lake or Lake of the Returned Sword based on this legend.īut despite the Rafetus swinhoei being revered, it is also extremely threatened. According to the legend passed from one generation to the next, this giant golden turtle emerged from the Hoan Kiem Lake to reclaim a magic sword used by the Le Loi King to defeat Chinese Ming forces in the 15th century. For the people of the country, the Hoan Kiem turtle, as it is known locally, is a symbol of Viet Nam’s independence and prosperity.
Like many turtle species, Swinhoe’s softshell turtle ( Rafetus swinhoei) has for centuries held special cultural significance in Viet Nam. This article was produced by Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute.įeatured image: The recently discovered female Rafetus swinhoei, caught and released in Viet Nam A 500-year-old legend is key to the survival of a rare giant softshell turtle.
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