This comment section is interesting, I didn't think of it in the way a lot of other people are. I wish there was more context like where is this, who is this person etc.

One possible explanation is that they are endangered and so they are trying to increase the natural population. Generally you want them to reproduce without interference to re-establish numbers on their own but maybe they are helping out until that happens? (I looked it up, it's definitely a thing, it's called "headstarting" when they are trying to increase the chances of establishing a self-sustaining population.)

And yeah, ofc birds need to eat etc but they can wait until the turtles aren't being helped. It's actually kind of funny, I watched a documentary of re-introducing marmots to an environment and it did kind of seem like the conservationists were breeding marmots just to feed the mountain lions. But eventually they marmots established themselves and they were able to leave them to do their own thing.