BFREE: Hicatee Conservation & Research Center (HCRC)

The Central American river turtle, also known locally as the hickatee or tortuga blanca, is the only living species in the family Dermatemydidae. Its closest relatives are only known from fossils with some 19 genera described from a worldwide distribution from the Jurassic and Cretaceous. Now it is on the brink of extinction.

The Hicatee Conservation & Research Center (HCRC) at the Belize Foundation for Research & Environmental Education (BFREE) was Mallory’s first international conservation trip and will forever hold a special place in her heart.

Joining the Turtle Survival Alliance during a health, she was able to film the first ultrasound of a gravid female and the very beginnings of the breeding facility that has now hatched (and reared) over a thousand critically-endangered Hicatee turtle, a cryptic freshwater chelonian that is on the verge of extinction do culinary traditions and overhunting.

She has also visited BFREE field station to cover a tropical mammal research story.

Mallory’s continues to support BFREE through social media highlights and providing her photographs for fundraising initiatives.