An English mystery: who killed seven giant tortoises in the forest?

It wasn't your usual crime scene. And they weren't your usual victims. But it was a tragedy nonetheless, one that has caught the attention of authorities in a sleepy corner of England.

Police in Devon and Cornwall are investigating how seven giant tortoises died this month in Ashclyst Forest, northeast of Exeter, England.

Two turtles were found on January 8, and five more on January 12, police said. Police have asked citizens to provide information if they have it. It is unclear who found the turtles, but police said “a member of the public” reported the dead animals.

For now, the only questions remain: how did these animals die? Where do they come from? Who are their owners? – and almost no answers.

“We would also like to hear from anyone who has recently purchased a giant tortoise in the area or knows someone who normally has a large number of tortoises, but now fewer,” police inspector Mark Arthurs said in a statement.

Police said the animals appeared to be Aldabra giant tortoises, which are native to Aldabra Island, part of the Seychelles archipelago in the Indian Ocean.

Aldabra tortoises need to live in very warm conditions, preferably temperatures above 30 degrees Celsius, or 86 degrees Fahrenheit, said Dr. James Gibbs, an expert in conservation biology and president of the nonprofit Galápagos Conservancy — a far cry from the nearly frozen English forest where the dead turtles were found.

“These are so-called cold-blooded animals, but they depend on very warm conditions to function,” said Dr. Gibbs. At low temperatures, he added, “they might survive an hour or two before they become so lethargic that they can't move.”

Temperatures in England during the week the turtles were found hovered around 2 degrees Celsius, or 35 degrees Fahrenheit. “To see them frozen in an English forest is a shocking observation,” said Dr. Gibbs.

“It's just a very bizarre situation,” he added. “Animals of this size and value are simply dumped without mercy.”

Based on the photos he had seen, Dr. Gibbs said the turtles appeared to be 10 to 20 years old, not yet adults. Giant tortoises can live up to 150 years, in rare cases even 200 years.

It appeared the turtles were also suffering from malnutrition, he said, as their shells appeared deformed and they appeared to have spent their entire lives in captivity. He added that they were “young turtles that had a long life ahead of them.”

Turtle smuggling is not uncommon, and giant tortoises can make a lot of money. The website Tortoise Town, based in New Jersey, sells young Aldabra tortoises bred in captivity for prices between $2,799 and $7,495.

Ashclyst Forest is a natural woodland meadow covering almost 300 hectares, according to a local tourism website. The forest has several walking trails and is home to butterflies, bluebells, birds and much more wildlife, according to the National Trust, the governing body of protected areas in England.

It is also extremely quiet most of the time.

“You could offload your dead animals there if you wanted to,” said Henry Massey, a local councilor who lives in the nearby village of Broadclyst. “If you go in the middle of the night, the chance of being disturbed is very small.”

Although people sometimes dump waste illegally in the forest, Mr Massey said these reptiles were an unusual sight. But a similar incident occurred in December 2021, when police said they received a report of a dead giant tortoise in the same area. But that case was closed and was not considered a police case at the time. Now police are trying to find out if the two incidents are related, they said.

Crime is extremely low in the area – “This is rural Devon,” Mr Massey said – and the sudden appearance of seven giant tortoise carcasses got people talking for a while. But in the weeks since the discoveries, the chatter in the village pub has largely returned to other matters as police search for new information.

“There's nothing in the rumor mill,” Mr. Massey said.