Red Eared Turtle, an invasive species threatening North-East India

A ‘cute’ American turtle popular as a pet is threatening to invade the natural water bodies across the Northeast.

• The red-eared turtles are native to the United States and Mexico, but due to their size, looks, and low maintenance, they are widely kept as pets. 
• Over the years they have been shipped across the world as pets, something that has had disastrous consequences.
• Today, the red-eared slider is regarded as the most invasive species of turtles in the world.
• Like in most parts of the world the red-eared sliders have reached India too and have started showing their true colours.
• The red-eared sliders have entered the waterbodies in India after they were abandoned by their owners.

What is Red-eared Turtle?

• The red-eared slider (Trachemys scripta elegans) derives its name from red stripes around the part where its ears would be and from its ability to slide quickly off any surface into the water.
• These invasive species are also known as red-eared sliders.
• Originated from the area around the Mississippi river and the Gulf of Mexico, they live in still and warm waterbodies such as ponds, lakes, streams, and slow- running rivers. 
• This turtle is an extremely popular pet due to its small size, easy maintenance, and relatively low cost.
• They are consistently designated one of the world’s hundred worst invasive species by the IUCN.

• Adverse impact on marine life: The red-eared turtles can have a devastating impact on the aquatic life.
• Threat to native plants: As an invasive species, the red-eared sliders don't have any natural predators, and since they are omnivores they pose a threat to both native aquatic animals and plants. They virtually leave nothing for the native species to eat.
• Rapid breeding: The red-eared slider turtles are considered a major threat to native turtle specials, as they mature fast, grow larger, and produce more offspring, and are very aggressive.
• Exotic diseases: The red-eared slider turtle often carries exotic diseases. As well as preying on native turtles, the pests compete for their food, nesting areas and basking sites as well as often spreading salmonella bacteria to people, pets and other animals.

• While the movement of plants and animals across habitats and ecosystems is a natural process — ecosystems are inherently dynamic, losing some species, gaining others — it is the constantly accelerating rate of invasions that today looms menacingly over the world’s economy.
• Increased human movement, domestic and trans-national, has caused such acceleration. 

India’s northeast

• India’s north-east is home to 21 of the 29 vulnerable native Indian species of freshwater turtles and tortoises.

• United States: The United States now has a federal umbrella agency to sniff out invasives, one empowered with a huge budget and stringent regulations.
• New Zealand: New Zealand, especially vulnerable because it is an island, has tight quarantine regulations and constant monitoring.

India cannot replicate the governance and monitoring that developed countries like New Zealand and the US practice. India, heterogenous and complex, can hardly afford to take such measures. Thus prevention becomes paramount for this country, and therefore prediction methods, risk analyses and evaluations of potential invasives in tropical environments.