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Life expectancy in the wild is thought to be over 100 years, [110] [111] making it one of the longest-lived species in the animal kingdom. Harriet , a specimen kept in Australia Zoo , was the oldest known Galápagos tortoise, having reached an estimated age of more than 170 years before her death in 2006. [ 112 ]
An Aldabra giant tortoise, an example of a giant tortoise.. Giant tortoises are any of several species of various large land tortoises, which include a number of extinct species, [1] as well as two extant species with multiple subspecies formerly common on the islands of the western Indian Ocean and on the Galápagos Islands.
Chelonoidis is a genus of turtles in the tortoise family erected by Leopold Fitzinger in 1835. [2] They are found in South America and the Galápagos Islands, and formerly had a wide distribution in the West Indies. The multiple subspecies of the Galápagos tortoise (C. niger) are among the largest extant terrestrial chelonians.
Now, some tortoise species are extinct or extinct in the wild and they live on six of the islands. The tortoises have an average lifespan of over 130 years. The marine iguana is also extremely unusual, since it is the only iguana adapted to life in the sea. Land iguanas, lava lizards, geckos and harmless snakes are also found on the islands.
In the wild, Galápagos tortoises, including the Pinta Island subspecies, rested about 16 hours a day. [citation needed] Galápagos tortoises are herbivores, they fed primarily on greens, grasses, native fruit, and cactus pads. They drank large quantities of water, which they could store in their bodies for long periods of time for later use.
Chelonoidis niger vandenburghi, also known as the Volcán Alcedo giant tortoise, the Alcedo Volcano giant tortoise or the Alcedo giant tortoise, is a subspecies of Galápagos tortoise endemic to the Galápagos archipelago in the equatorial eastern Pacific Ocean.
Van Denburgh, 1907 : Expedition of the California Academy of Sciences to the Galapagos Islands, 1905–1906. I. Preliminary descriptions of four new races of gigantic land tortoises from the Galapagos Islands. Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, ser. 4, vol. 1, p. 1–6
The wild reproduction is successful in the east, but in the western-southwestern area, rats, dogs, cats and pigs are present as predators. It is one of the most threatened of the existing subspecies, and 20 adults were taken into captivity for a breeding program in 1998 following the threat of a volcanic eruption from the nearby Cerro Azul ...