Community-led antitrafficking networks are proving pivotal in helping authorities intercept poachers targeting critically endangered and endemic tortoises in southern Madagascar’s fast-disappearing spiny forests. Illegal hunting, both for their meat and to supply the pet trade, has decimated the species’ population in recent decades. Indigenous people living in the range of the imperiled species are motivated to protect them due to long-standing traditional beliefs that value and respect the tortoises. But local efforts can't solve everything; experts urge more action at national and international levels to step up law enforcement, combat systemic corruption, and crack down on the transnational criminal networks orchestrating the trade.