Turtle Survival Alliance

Rick Hudson (President)
Rick Hudson was a Curator in the Fort Worth Zoo's renown Department of Herpetology for twenty years, before moving to the zoo's Conservation & Science Department in 2000 as Conservation Biologist. Rick helped organize the IUCN Iguana Specialist Group, which he helped lead from 1997 - 2008, and developed the International Iguana Foundation. In 2001 Rick organized an IUCN Asian Turtle Workshop - Developing Conservation Strategies through Captive Management - that led to the formation of the TSA as an IUCN partnership network for sustainable captive management of freshwater turtles and tortoises. Rick served as the co-chair of the TSA from 2001 to 2009 and under his leadership the TSA grew into an independent NGO that supports or manages turtle research and conservation programs in Madagascar, Brazil, Mexico and throughout Asia.

Dwight Lawson (Vice President)

Dwight Lawson holds a Ph.D. in Quantitative Biology from the University of Texas at Arlington and is the Sr. Vice President of Collections, Education and Conservation at Zoo Atlanta, overseeing the animal and plant collections as well as the zoo's education, research and conservation programs. He is also an Adjunct Professor of Biology at Georgia State University where he regularly teaches. Before joining Zoo Atlanta, Dr. Lawson worked as an Associate Research Scientist for The Wildlife Conservation Society where he directed a community-based wildlife conservation project in southwestern Cameroon, Africa. Dwight helped found the Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA) and served as co-chair of the TSA, President of the TSA Foundation and chair of the TSA's Animal Management Committee. Dwight is currently involved in revamping the TSA's Animal Management process and strategies.

Chuck Landrey (Secretary and Marketing Committee Chair)
Chuck Landrey is founder of the Turtle Conservation Project and the New England Turtle Atlas. He runs the Thai Turtle Trust, a conservation initiative of the food brand "A Taste of Thai." Chuck is past Chair of NE-PARC's Box Turtle Working Group and organized the 2008 Diamondback Terrapin Conference on Cape Cod. He is currently filming a documentary about New England's turtles.

Walter Sedgwick (Treasurer and Finance Committee Chair)
Walter C. Sedgwick has a long-standing interest in conservation and has served on the Boards of a diverse range of conservation NGO's, including the National Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy - Florida, Bat Conservation International, Island Conservation, the Pacific Forest Trust and the Wildlife Conservation Society, where he is Chair of the Program Committee. Because of his interests in turtles, he helped to found the Turtle Conservation Fund in 2002. Walter has been a driving force behind the TSA's strategic fund-raising efforts for many years, helping to get programs in India and Myanmar off the ground, and most recently championing the effort to bring the pair of Rafetus in China together for breeding.

Scott Davis (Executive Director)
Scott Davis holds a Ph.D. in Population Biology from Washington University. He was a Genetics professor at Texas A&M University and served two years as Chairman. His research program focused on the genetic analyses underlying the recovery programs for everything from Speke's Gazelles to Galapagos tortoises, to the measurement of levels of variation at quantitative trait loci, to the positional cloning and identification of the genes responsible for quantitative variation. In 2000 Scott left the University environment to found Biotech startup companies. He retired in the fall of 2006 and lives with his two sons on a ranch in the Texas Hill Country where he focuses on the captive breeding of giant Asian softshell turtles in the genera Chitra and Pelochelys. In the fall of 2008, Scott left retirement to assume the position of Executive Director of the Turtle Survival Alliance.

Bill Holmstrom
Bill Holmstrom started his career with the Department of Herpetology at the Wildlife Conservation Society's (WCS) Bronx Zoo in 1976 and has served as the Department Collection Manager since 1988. He was appointed Species Coordinator and Studbook Keeper for the American Zoo and Aquarium Association's Radiated Tortoise Species Survival Plan (SSP) in 1985, and became Studbook Keeper and Co-coordinator for the Burmese Star Tortoise SSP in 2006. Bill has served as an instructor in a number of WCS and TSA sponsored workshops in SE Asia, and he maintains and breeds a group of pancake tortoises for TSA at his home. Bill retired from WCS in March 2009.

John Iverson
John B. Iverson holds a PhD in Biology from the University of Florida and is Professor of Biology and Director of the Joseph Moore Museum of Natural History at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana. Because of his interests in the natural history, ecology, and evolution of iguanas and turtles, he is currently Deputy Chair (and founding member) of the IUCN/SSC Iguana Specialist Group, and on the Steering Committee (and founding member) of the IUCN/SSC Tortoise and Freshwater Turtle Specialist Group. He has been on the Scientific Advisory Committee to the Turtle Survival Alliance since its inception in 2001. He has maintained long-term field research sites for rock iguanas in the Exumas in the Bahamas, and for turtles at the Crescent Lake National Wildlife Refuge in western Nebraska. His hobby is restoring a 76 acre woodlot (now in a Conservation Easement) to a mature hardwood forest.

Pat Koval (Governance Committee Chair)
Pat Koval is a partner of Torys LLP, a business law firm based in Toronto, Ontario and New York, New York. She practices in the area of corporate and commercial law, with primary emphasis on corporate finance, securities regulation and mergers and acquisitions. Among other things, Pat co-founded and is co-chair of the firm's interdisciplinary Climate Change and Emissions Trading Practice Group. She is also a member of the Environmental Finance Advisory Committee and the Carbon Finance Advisory Committee of the Centre for Environment, at the University of Toronto. Pat has had a long history of involvement with, and support for, organizations and public interest groups dedicated to conservation and, in particular, to species preservation. She has been a member of the boards of directors of a number of small Canadian charitable organizations focused primarily on the conservation of African wildlife and endangered reptiles. She has served as a Director of World Wildlife Fund (Canada) for nine years and is currently the Chairman of the Board of WWF.

Lonnie McCaskill
Lonnie McCaskill has spent a lifetime working with tortoises and crocodilians, starting as a Junior High school volunteer in the Dallas Zoo, moving to the White Oak Conservation Center and currently working as a Zoological Manager at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. Lonnie was part of the opening team for Animal Kingdom and was instrumental in the animal transport, husbandry, and training for the Primate and Ituri areas of the park. He also serves on the Steering Committee of the AZA Crocodile Advisory Group and as a member of the IUCN Crocodile Specialist Group. Lonnie has been involved with the TSA since its inception in 2001 and has served as the annual Conference Chair for every TSA Annual Meeting.  He has participated on several TSA missions to Asia to help build and design breeding facilities and triage confiscated group of turtles and tortoises at the Yadandabon Zoo in Myanmar. In addition, Lonnie owns and operates Expedition Cargo, a socially-conscious business that imports cultural art, artifacts, textiles and other distinctive items for the private collector, home decorator and business. Expedition Cargo partners with international conservation non-government organizations (NGOs) to help support indigenous communities, providing economic resources to impoverished areas from the sale of handmade items.

John Mitchell
No bio or photo currently available

Colin Poole
Colin Poole is currently the Director of the Asia Program for the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) based out of the Bronx Zoo and works closely with the TSA on turtle conservation programs in Cambodia, Myanmar, China and Indonesia. He has worked in Southeast and East Asia since 1988 and founded WCS's Cambodia Program where he spent seven years. He has published widely on conservation issues in Cambodia and also serves on the board of the Turtle Conservation Fund.

Hugh Quinn
Hugh Quinn holds a PhD in Biology and has spent his career in zoos: as Supervisor of Education at the Fort Worth Zoo, Zoological Curator at the Oklahoma City Zoo, Curator of Herpetology at the Houston Zoo, Director at the Topeka Zoo, and finally as General Curator at the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo (retired). Hugh currently resides in the Black Hills of South Dakota, and serves on the Board of Directors and Animal Management Committee of the Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA), on the Steering Committee of the IUCN/SSC Tortoise and Freshwater Turtle Specialist Group (TFTSG), as Co-Chair of the Turtle Conservation Fund (TCF), and as Research Associate at Black Hills State University in Spearfish, South Dakota. He has been very active in the Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles (SSAR), and served as president of that organization.

Anders Rhodin
Dr. Anders G.J. Rhodin, M.D., is Founder and Director of Chelonian Research Foundation (CRF), a private nonprofit organization focused on production, publication, and support of research and conservation efforts for turtles and tortoises. He is Chair of the IUCN/SSC Tortoise and Freshwater Turtle Specialist Group (TFTSG) and Treasurer of the Marine Turtle Specialist Group (MTSG). He is also Co-Chair of the Turtle Conservation Fund, a partnership-based strategizing and funding consortium supporting global turtle conservation efforts. Additionally, he is Editor of Chelonian Conservation and Biology and Chelonian Research Monographs, two peer-reviewed professional scientific journals published by CRF in association with the TFTSG and MTSG. He is also an orthopedic surgeon and maintains an active private medical practice.

Frank Slavens
Frank Slavens retired in 2001 as Curator of Reptiles from the Woodland Park Zoo (WPS) in Seattle WA where he worked for 30 years. While at the WPS, Frank produced numerous editions of his book Reptiles and Amphibians in Captivity, a series of annually produced inventories of the world's reptiles and amphibians in captive collections. Each volume represented almost 500 collections, both public and private, with contact phone numbers and addresses. Sections on longevity and breeding were invaluable tools for those interested in the captive breeding of reptiles and amphibians. In 1990 he started the Western Pond Turtle Head-start & Recovery program at WPZ in cooperation with the Washington Dept of Fish & Wildlife. The program eventually expanded to include the Oregon Zoo. The main turtle site is in the Columbia River Gorge area along the Washington/Oregon border. After retiring from the zoo, Frank and his wife Kate moved down to the Gorge to continue their work with pond turtles. Frank and Kate have generously supported the TSA in recent years.

Bill Zeigler (Development Committee Chair)
F. William (Bill) Zeigler is President of Zeigler & Zeigler, Inc. a consulting firm for zoos, aquariums, and wildlife organizations on fundraising, exhibit design and master planning. Bill began his zoological career at Crandon Park Zoo in Miami, Florida going on to becoming the General Curator and Curator of Reptiles for the Miami Metrozoo. During his tenure at Miami Metrozoo he received numerous awards including the AZA's prestigious Bean Award for his crocodilian breeding program, which resulted in four first breeding records for crocodilians in North America. Upon leaving Miami Metrozoo, Bill became Vice President of Animal Science for Ogden Entertainment of New York, where he was instrumental in developing American Wildlife Experience, a series of facilities exhibiting North American wildlife. Although he is no longer in the zoological profession, Bill still lecturers for the AZA's Crocodilian Biology and Captive Management course on exhibit design and husbandry. He is a member of IUCN/SSC Crocodilian Specialist Group, Tortoise and Freshwater Turtle Specialist Group, past Development Coordinator for the Gharial Conservation Alliance and served on the TSA Steering Committee for five years where he was instrumental in leading their financial growth.