Putting things in perspective....

[Nick Armstrong]

This is a recent picture of Jonathan. He's a giant tortoise on St Helena:





And this is also Jonathan, snapped in 1902 (with a Boer War prisoner and guard)...



If that isn't extraordinary enough, Jonathan is estimated to have been 70 years old when the latter photo was taken.

In other words he was born about a decade after Napoleon died on St. Helena...

[Serial_Apologist]

You wonder how his heart manages to keep going, propelling all that weight around, however slowly.

[teamsaint]

Great photos Cals.



TAlking of that turtles, whichwe weren't, spare a thought for these chaps, only 4 left in the world

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangtze_giant_softshell_turtle

Turtles, and frogs are facing disastrous declines and extinction threats all over the world.

http://www.seeturtles.org/sea-turtles-threats?gclid=CP2i5q_wqsQCFSbJtAod_1MAcQ

http://www.seeturtles.org/sea-turtles-threats?gclid=CP2i5q_wqsQCFSbJtAod_1MAcQ

One in three species of frogs have extinction threats.

[Nick Armstrong]

I met Lonesome George when I was in the Galapagos Islands...



He died in 2012, just a young adult at about 100 years old. He was the last of his subspecies

[Petrushka]

How do they know it's the same tortoise?

[Pabmusic]

How do they know it's the same tortoise?

Because it taught us so. [© Lewis Carroll]

[Nick Armstrong]

How do they know it's the same tortoise?

If you look at the shell pattern and structure, it's identical in both pictures of Jonathan (e.g. the three little humps along the top). Although in fact it is apparently the lower shell that is a tortoise's equivalent of our fingerprints.

The plastron (lower shell) of each tortoise is as individual as our fingerprints are to us. The carapace (upper shell) may also be distinctive, and together these can positively identify any given animal. (http://www.britishcheloniagroup.org....fingerprinting)

[MrGongGong]

How do they know it's the same tortoise?

Because it's the same one that wrote the cello suites ?

[Richard Tarleton]

I met Lonesome George when I was in the Galapagos Islands...

Fascinating and startling Attenborough programme the other day about the humans on Galapagos showing a side of the islands we don't normally see in wildlife documentaries.....no surprise to visitors to the islands I'm sure.....