- Peter Pritchard
Infobox scientist
name = Dr. Peter Pritchard
image_size = 150px
birth_date = 1943
birth_place =
nationality =
field = Zoology
work_institutions = Chelonian Research Institute
alma_mater =University of Florida Oxford University
doctoral_advisor =
doctoral_students =
known_for = Work for the Conservation of turtles
prizes =Dr. Peter Pritchard (born 1943) is a leading turtle zoologist. Educated at
Oxford University and theUniversity of Florida , where he earned his Ph.D. in Zoology, he is most commonly known for his campaign of almost 40 years for the conservation of turtles. Appropriately, his privately funded Chelonian Research Institute, for the study and preservation of turtles, is located inOviedo, Florida ,United States , just a half hour's drive fromDisney World .Pritchard has done his most important and innovative work along the Atlantic coast of
Guyana , theSouth America n country that is home to four of the world's eight knownsea turtle species: the leatherback, green, hawksbill and the olive ridley. By the 1960s, overhunting by localArawak Indians — themselves an endangered group — had ravaged the turtle population.Pritchard tried to save both the turtles and the tribe. He lobbied Guyana and private sources for grants that lowered the Arawak consumption of turtle meat and he helped them to farm chickens. He hired Arawaks at his study camp to tag turtles for research and to police nesting grounds to prevent attacks from poachers. The turtle population has increased, he says, because turtle protection is now "a family discipline thing" among Arawaks "rather than an outsider laying down the law." Along the way, Pritchard's own scholarship has benefited from centuries' worth of tribal turtle knowledge. He has also done extensive study and written books about
alligator snapping turtle s andGalapagos tortoise s.References
Environmental Science Program [http://www.smu.edu/esp/Lectures/pritchard.html]
External links
* [http://www.chelonianresearch.wordpress.com "Chelonian Research Institute" official website of the Chelonian Research Institute in Oviedo, FL]
TIME.com: Heroes of the Planet [http://www.time.com/time/reports/environment/heroes/heroesgallery/0,2967,pritchard,00.html]
Interview [http://www.anapsid.org/pritchard.html]
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