Title
KURMA-Tracking Indian Turtles: A Citizen Science Tool for Turtle Conservation in India
Author(s)
Sreeparna Dutta; Arunima Singh; Shailendra Singh; Jose Louies
Published
2020
Abstract
Turtles are one of the endangered and neglected group of animals facing extreme survival challenges in terms of habitat destruction, illegal trade, targeted hunting for meat and eggs and various other anthropogenic causes. With four biodiversity hotspot India harbours 24 species of freshwater turtles, 5 species of marine turtles and 5 species of tortoises and most of the species are protected under various schedules of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972.However there exists a severe dearth of knowledge on species distribution and ecological information along with lack of awareness among general public about turtles and their ecological roles. “KURMA- Tracking Indian Turtles” a mobile application was launched, under the collaborative citizen science initiative between Indian Turtle conservation Action Network (ITCAN) and WCS/TSA India Turtle Conservation Program, exclusively for aiding turtle conservation in India, a shared platform for laypersons, professionals, stakeholders to come together for wide spread and effective unit to tackle threats to turtles and tortoises of India. KURMA can not only educate the general public on turtles, the threats they face and their ecological importance, but also provides opportunities to contribute to real time scientific data collection by recording turtle sightings, help authorities to curb illegal and aiding in nationwide rescue and triage of turtles. In long term KURMA will serve as large citizen science database containing a huge and growing volume of turtle sighting data which will be used to, analyse and monitor distribution and population of turtles along with identification of critical turtle habitats for conservation implications.
Full Citation
Dutta, S., A. Singh, S. Singh, and J. Louies (2020). KURMA-Tracking Indian Turtles: A Citizen Science Tool for Turtle Conservation in India. National Conference on Citizen Science for Biodiversity CitSci India 2020.
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