Wildlife conservationists across Alachua County, the state of Florida and several other southeastern states are setting aside Thursday, April 10, to recognize National Gopher Tortoise Day.  

With populations spanning all 67 counties, gopher tortoises are far too busy as Florida’s only native tortoise species for training to race rabbits. The reptiles serve their ecosystem as a keynote species with over 400 other species depending on them for survival. 

But for nearly two decades, gopher tortoises have also been classified as a threatened species in Florida as only 700,000 to 800,000 remain—nearly a 60% population decline. The Gopher Tortoise Council established National Gopher Tortoise Day in 2016 aiming to shine a light on the plight of the gopher tortoise and provide education for curbing the decline of these “ecosystem engineers.” 

“Gopher Tortoise Day brings awareness,” said Jade Woodling, a conservation education curator at the Santa Fe College Teaching Zoo, which houses a gopher tortoise rehabilitation program. “It’s really hard to even comprehend the impact it would have on our ecosystem if we lost almost 400 species of animals.” 

Woodling said watching a gopher tortoise use its shovel-like front legs to dig its burrow which so many creatures rely on is one of her favorite things to see an animal do. 

She said it only takes about one hour for them to dig a few feet, with completed burrows reaching up to six-and-a-half feet deep and 15 feet long. Each burrow features a chamber large enough for the tortoise to turn itself around in and an angled position of the burrow helps regulate the humidity and temperature inside. 

Commensal species benefiting from the burrows, like indigo snakes, alligators, frogs, mice, burrowing owls and insects, often need a safe place to raise their young or escape threats like forest fires. 

Even though gopher tortoises can live up to 60 years in the wild, Woodling said their survival rate as hatchlings is still relatively low and heightened as more threats come their way. In the wild, she said the tortoise’s biggest threats are fire ants, whose bites can become fatally toxic, and “nest marauders,” such as raccoons. 

But Woodling said the most harmful threat gopher tortoises face is habitat degradation and fragmentation from human development.  

“We like the same habitats they do,” she said. “They like upland, dry, sandy areas that are perfect for digging burrows and they don’t have to worry about the water table so close. But it’s what we love to put our housing developments on and put our agricultural fields on, and so they’re losing a lot of that.” 

According to a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service species status assessment report from 2021, 97% of the southeast’s original upland longleaf pine habitat where the gopher tortoise thrived is gone.  

Elise Bennett, the Florida director and senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, said the remaining 3% still have gopher tortoises on them that need to be cared for. 

“The well-being of gopher tortoises is intimately linked to the well-being of our upland ecosystems here in Florida,” Bennett said in the gopher tortoise documentary “Gopher Games.” 

When developers fail to inspect a site for gopher tortoise burrows or invest in the resources to relocate them, the tortoises can be entombed after concrete foundations seal them inside their burrows. Bennett said this leads to a painful six-month to one-year-long death of dehydration and starvation as the tortoise unsuccessfully attempts to escape. 

In 1991, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) issued Incidental Take Permits (ITP), which allowed developers to entomb gopher tortoises. Although ITPs are no longer issued, approximately 3,000 still remain active as of 2023 and around 104,000 gopher tortoises have been killed due to ITPs.  

The fragmentation induced by roads on developments can also separate populations of gopher tortoises and prohibit them from procreating. But some say the way relocation is done still isn’t the best situation for the animals because it doesn’t solve the issue that they’re losing their habitat and going into a smaller, foreign one that could expose them to new diseases. 

“You’re talking about an animal that has an incredibly long lifespan, and produces a lot of offspring,” said Chase Pirtle, a manager of the Ashton Biological Preserve. “[And] 400 acres is not going to sustain a population.” 

Woodling said there are multiple ways people can use National Gopher Tortoise Day to rally around the reptiles and help protect them. The Santa Fe College Teaching Zoo will post about the day on social media and provide educational opportunities at their “Party for the Planet” event on April 19.  

She also said people staying on top of their ballots with habitat restoration and preservation initiatives should write to their elected officials.  

“I think it’d be especially nice to have the younger community, more diversity in the faces seeing a town hall meeting,” Woodling said. “That’s where we all have different perspectives and different lifestyles that we’re sharing with gopher tortoises.” 

People can look for ways to help in their small circles, added Woodling, such as aiding a gopher tortoise crossing the road or participating in the Gopher Tortoise Friendly Yard Recognition Program. She said it’s hard not to rally behind such cute creatures when the love for them is already there in the community. 

“People really do love turtles and tortoises,” she said. “[The zoo has] a Quarters for Conservation program when you come in and 50 cents of your admission goes towards one of the three projects we have every year. If we have a turtle or tortoise one, it has like a 75% chance of winning amongst many mammals.”