Will the slow and steady tortoise outlive the human race? For over 200 million years tortoises have evolved and adapted to their environment. Some have the ability to store up to 40% of their body weight in water, and others can live for a year without drinking or eating. Unfortunately, these survival techniques have been used against them by their greatest threat – human beings. In the Galápagos Islands, tortoises were once hunted for their meat and kept by sailors as a source of fresh food on long voyages. Today, two of the approximately 14 giant tortoise species that lived on the archipelago have gone extinct. However, out of those who have fought for existence, a genetic match was recently discovered of an ancient relative thought to have died out 100 years ago. Learn more about how studies like this could fast track the preservation of one of the world's slowest animals.
Up Next in Season 1
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Caribou
Caribou are essential to the livelihoods and identity of indigenous communities. But this species is on the decline as the result of a changing climate, logging, and mining. Habitat loss disrupts their migratory routes, placing caribou calves in greater danger from predation. First Nations in Can...
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American Buffalo
For hundreds of years, American buffalo have been an important part of the spiritual and cultural lives of indigenous peoples, and a vital component of the Great Plains ecosystem which extends from Canada to Texas. But when settlers learned how Native Americans depended on the buffalo for surviva...
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Wasps
Everybody hates wasps, but what if they were the secret to our survival? Wasps are feared for being able to sting multiple times and many people believe they provide no environmental service. Yet in the future, our food security could rely on them. As we begin to see the decline of bees, wasps ar...
