Ecuador confirmed Tuesday, after DNA analyzes, that the giant tortoise discovered in 2019 in the Galapagos archipelago does indeed belong to a species that experts have believed to be extinct for more than a century.
“We thought it had been extinct for over 100 years!
We have confirmed its existence.
The tortoise of the species Chelonoidis phantasticus has been discovered in #Galapagos ”, tweeted the Minister of the Environment, Gustavo Manrique.
¡Se creía extinta hace más de 100 años!
Hemos reconfirmed su existencia.
The tortuga of the species Chelonoidis phantasticus fue encontrada in # Galapagos.
Empezar con tan buenas noticias nuestra gestión es una linda coincidencia.
La esperanza está intacta.
#JuntosLoLogramos pic.twitter.com/KOmBMLIfEY
- Gustavo Manrique M. (@GustavoManriq_M) May 25, 2021
In order to precisely determine its species, a team of geneticists from the American University of Yale compared the DNA of this female turtle found on Fernandina Island with that of a male, the last to have been recorded in the Galapagos in 1906. This specimen is now a museum piece and belongs to the California Academy of Sciences.
Save the species
The giant tortoise Chelonoidis phantasticus is endemic to Fernandina, an uninhabited 638 km2 island in the Galapagos, a volcanic archipelago in the Pacific famous for its unique flora and fauna.
It is one of 15 species of giant tortoises recorded in the archipelago, including two extinct, Chelonoidis spp from Santa Fe Island, and Chelonoidis abigdoni from Pinta Island.
"This discovery of course strengthens our hope of saving this species, in order to prevent it from a fate similar to that of George the lonely", the emblem of the archipelago, underlined Danny Rueda, the director of the Galapagos National Park (PNG ), according to comments reported by the Ministry of the Environment.
George, the last specimen of Chelonoidis abingdoni, had died without offspring in 2012 for failing to agree to mate with females of similar species.
A new expedition
The ministry also announced that national park rangers and scientists are preparing an expedition to Fernandina Island for the second half of the year to search for other specimens of Chelonoidis phantasticus.
The adult female, discovered in 2019 during an expedition organized by the PNG and the American environmental organization Galapagos Conservancy, was hidden in the vegetation that grows between the petrified lava flows of the La Cumbre volcano, one of the most active in the planet.
The giant tortoises arrived three to four million years ago in the Galapagos archipelago, located 1,000 km from the coast of Ecuador and which the English naturalist Charles Darwin used to develop his theory on the evolution of species.
It seems that they were then dispersed on the islands by sea currents and thus developed 15 different species, two of which are now extinct.
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Tortoise