A six-year-old project to return giant tortoises to the wild in Madagascar could result in thousands of the 350kg megaherbivores re-populating the island for the first time in 600 years.
The first group of Aldabra giant tortoises (Aldabrachelys gigantea) were brought in from the Seychelles in 2018, and have been reproducing on their own since. A group of ecologists explain how reintroducing this tortoise to areas degraded by cattle grazing will help restore the island’s forests, grassy woodlands and shrublands of the past. It could also help prevent devastating forest fires in future.
Animals like this where lots of babies never made it to adulthood naturally are really easy to reintroduce.
They’re just sheltering the young till they’re big/strong enough that smaller predators cant fuck with them. Then releasing them into the wild.