Mom's Big World Assignment in the Galapagos Islands continued.....
.....on Santa Cruz Island to the Charles Darwin Research Center. A main focus of this Center is to prolong and breed the Galapagos Tortoise population to avoid extinction.The Tortoises in my previous post were in the wild, but there are some friendly resident Tortoises that live here.
Juan: Hey look! It's JB's mom!
Jose: I think you are right, Juan! It is JB's mom!! Let's tell George too!
The Charles Darwin Center is also home to "Lonesome George", who is the last known living Pinta Tortoise. The Center continues to try to encourage George to breed with other species of Tortoises to try to continue his blood line, but so far no luck.
George looks a bit sad, don't you think?
Since the 1970's, the Center has been successful in bringing population numbers of 10 endangered species of Tortoises back to guarded levels. Each Tortoise is numbered on their shell to keep track of them.
Then came something mom truly did not want to see.....
Tortoises are naturally vegetarian, but here was rebel Tortoise #17, eating my friend, the Rat! This is very unusual and someone from the Center came immediately to remove the Rat.
George looks a bit sad, don't you think?
Then came something mom truly did not want to see.....
Ok, on that note, I hope my next new animal friends will not be DEAD!!
Next up will be a hike to an old volcanic crater, to search for Darwin's Finches!
10 comments:
WHoa!!!!! How many of doze tingz doez it takes to eats a vishus vegan deer????
At least it wasn't - a - ummmm - chikhken!
Hugz&Khysses,
Khyra
We did not know tortoises would eat anything but plants and vegetables!
wow, those tortoise things are kind of ugly but that rat was awesome. did we ever tell you about the time Brody killed the rat? too bad you weren't there, JB. you would like to hunt rats, wouldn't you???!!! hee hee (maybe not)
woofs
EWWWWWWWs!!! Those tortoises is scary! I would need to grab dem by the shell and pull them around! And the dead thing...smells funny!
MBB
Wow, they sure do have long necks! That rebel tortoise and that rat left us speechless. We thought they were vegetarians too.:)
Love,
Teddy Bear
Hi JB and JB's mommi!
We've missed you so much! Happy Howlidays!
Wow! Your mommi is so lucky she gets to visit all those awesome animals!
That's strange how the tortoise was eating a rat.. never even heard of that before!
Tail wags,
Maya and Kena
First of all, happy new year to all your family, JB! Joy and many marvelous friends!
Ah, I'm very sad for George... I've wrote about him some years ago too and had a hope they will be successful to find him a fiancee. Maybe they have to proceed with the artificial insemination...
Well, I could imagine it that the tortoises eat meat too. As I see in our "factory" life, all herbivorous and birds eat meat if they can find it.
Oh Iiked that post. i could understand the Spanish, the tortoises are magnificent, and I totally empathise with the ratcatcher. Are you sure he was eating it and not just making sure it was very dead? I like to swing them around myself (the rats I mean).
Pippa
Poor Lonesome George. He does look sad. I hope there is some successful breeding. I would hate for him to be the last known living Pinta Tortoise.
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