At 176 years of age, Jonathan is thought to be the oldest known tortoise in the world and lives on the tiny island called St Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean having been imported to the island in 1882 at the age of fifty - although there is a theory that Jonathan is a fake and the Seychelles tortoise in the photo was in fact another tortoise named Jonathan which died in 1910.
The previously recorded oldest tortoise was a Giant Galapagos tortoise named Harriet who died at the Australia Zoo in 2006 and was thought to have sailed out on the Beagle with Charles Darwin, after his expedition to the Galapagos Islands.
I was stimulated into researching the oldest living tortoise because I think I have found a picture of the oldest know fossilised tortoise in the world.
Take a look at this picture, posted by Shelley on the Landscape Juice Network and see if you can spot the several million year old beast:-o))
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