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Tortoises on the way down are bouncing back thanks to a desert conservation effort

Photo of tortoise hatchlings raised at the Tortoise Research and Captive Rearing Site.
Tortoise hatchlings are raised at the Tortoise Research and Captive Rearing Site. Vulnerable tortoises from combat training areas throughout the vast Marine Corps base are cared for at the facility.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. It’s Sunday. I’m your host, Andrew J. Campa. Here’s what you need to know to start your weekend:

    With a little help, desert tortoises are blooming in Twentynine Palms

    From about mid-May to mid-September, the highs in the sun-soaked desert town of Twentynine Palms rarely dip below 90 degrees. The city is located in the Mojave Desert, about 140 miles east of Los Angeles and serves as a gateway to Joshua Tree National Park.

    It’s an area where the Marine Corps., known for its toughness, established an Air Ground Task Force Training Command and Air Guard Combat Center.

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    Around the base the sounds of rumbling tanks and live explosives along with the sparse desert environment can paint a rough picture.

    Yet, in that seemingly hostile environment, there is kindness.

    It happens daily when fledgling, vulnerable desert tortoises exit their burrows upon detecting the footsteps of conservationist Brian Henen.

    He tosses them handfuls of bok choy and snap peas. The feed will help the desert dwellers grow from their current stature — about the size of a deck of playing cards and easy pickings for predators — to fully grown and sturdy adults.

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    It’s a turtles boot camp that’s helping the tortoise survive and ultimately thrive in a habitat that would be permanently damaged without their presence.

    Save the tortoise

    My colleague Alex Wigglesworth detailed this survival story from the Marine base, site of the Tortoise Research and Captive Rearing Site.

    The tortoises live in a sheltered habitat ringed by barbed wire and draped in netting.

    The setup is designed to protect them from ravens, coyotes and other predators, along with the other harms a Marine base might present.

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    Some call this place Tortoise Gitmo, after the U.S. Navy’s Guantanamo Bay base and prison camp in Cuba.

    Officially it’s called the Tortoise Research and Captive Rearing Site, and since it was established in 2005 it has helped scientists learn how to protect a species that’s threatened by human encroachment, disease and climate change.

    What goes on at the site?

    Initially, biologists gathered eggs from wild females and raised the hatchlings until they were hardy enough to stand a chance against predators and drought, in a process known as head-starting.

    The facility got an influx of new tenants in 2017, when the military relocated tortoises to make way for a controversial expansion of the base’s training grounds. Biologists decided to head-start about 550 young tortoises that were taken from expansion areas.

    Then, starting a couple of years ago, Henen’s team began gathering, incubating and hatching eggs from the relocated adult tortoises to study whether they were breeding with their new neighbors. Rather than release the hatchlings into the wild, where they were unlikely to survive, they decided to head-start them as well.

    In desert tortoise head-starting programs, biologists use radio transmitters to monitor wild females and portable X-ray machines to determine when they’re pregnant. They bring those females inside enclosures to lay their eggs, then release them. The hatchlings are reared in captivity until they reach a certain length — Twentynine Palms uses a threshold of 110 millimeters, or about 4 inches long, which can take between seven and nine years — and then rereleased, typically with radio transmitters to monitor their health and movements.

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    Threats to the tortoise are everywhere

    Desert tortoises were once so plentiful that people driving through the Mojave would take them home. But in some patches of California desert, their numbers have dropped by up to 96% since the 1970s, according to study plots monitored by Kristin Berry, supervisory research wildlife biologist at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Western Ecological Research Center.

    The Marines are hardly the only threat to tortoises. Roads and highways have carved up previously wide-open stretches of desert into parcels that are in some cases too small to allow for the breeding and genetic diversity needed to sustain their population health. A warming climate has dried up the precipitation needed to sustain them in some places.

    Livestock not native to the desert have grazed and trampled the plants tortoises like to eat, spreading unpalatable nonnative grasses in their wake. Power lines have added miles of resting perches for ravens, allowing them to more easily spot young tortoises.

    The desert would be forever changed without the tortoises

    “The desert tortoise is considered a keystone species, which means that they have a disproportionate effect on the entire ecosystem,” says Henen, a civilian who heads the conservation branch of the base’s Environmental Affairs Division.

    The tortoises pockmark the desert floor with burrows that other animals use for shelter, and disperse the seeds of native plants in their waste. “They’re influencing what else can exist on the landscape,” Henen said.

    For more on the desert tortoise’s progress, check out the full article.

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    The week’s biggest stories

    A woman protests at a public meeting.
    (Gary Coronado / Los Angeles Times)

    Environment and housing

    Crime, courts and policing

    Travel and weather

    Holiday gift ideas and advice

    More big stories


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    Column One

    Column One is The Times’ home for narrative and long-form journalism. Here’s a great piece from this week:

    A car spins in the burnout box as fans watch on the final Thursday Night Thunder and Irwindale Speedway.
    (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times)

    The two racers idled in their vehicles near the starting line, one behind the other, waiting for their last chance to blast down the drag strip at Irwindale Speedway. They were bound by a love for speed — but that’s about all they had in common.

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    More great reads


    How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to essentialcalifornia@latimes.com.


    For your weekend

    Photo of a man on a background of colorful illustrations like a book, dog, pizza, TV, shopping bag, and more.
    (Illustrations by Lindsey Made This; photograph by Gilbert Flores / Variety via Getty Images)

    Going out

    Staying in

    L.A. Affairs

    Get wrapped up in tantalizing stories about dating, relationships and marriage.

    A rejection led to a break of negative thoughts, and helped resume my life.
    (Chiara Xie)

    They met at a boba shop in West Hollywood. When he stepped into the shop’s fluorescent light, his bright blue eyes, lightly lined with black eyeliner, met hers. He pulled her into his tall, lean frame, and she inhaled the scent of him — something akin to a chimney. For the next five months, they had a casual arrangement that was as exhilarating as it was confusing. To say she was drawn to him would be an understatement, but would this infatuation continue, or was there more substance beyond the bedroom?

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    Have a great weekend, from the Essential California team

    Andrew J. Campa, reporter
    Carlos Lozano, news editor

    Check our top stories, topics and the latest articles on latimes.com.

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