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giant love
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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
These animals belong to the most ancient group of reptiles, appearing about 250 million years ago. In the Upper Cretaceous, 70 or 80 million years ago some already became gigantic and about 1 million years ago these reptiles reached the Galápagos Islands. Until 100,000 years ago most of the gigantic species began to disappear for unknown causes and only 250 years ago there were at least 20 species and subspecies in islands of the Indian Ocean and 14 or 15 species in the Galapagos Islands. From those, only one of the species of the Indian Ocean survives in the wild, the Aldabra Giant Tortoise (two more are claimed to exist in captive or re-released populations, but some genetic studies have cast doubt on the validity of these as separate species) and 11 in Galápagos.
-- I had to crop the picture , the picture was taken under very cloudy conditions at the atlanta zoo. |
cecilia has marked this note useful
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Spot on Jessica, lovely pair...
Cecilia
Hi Jessica,
Good shot, you sure they aren't racing? :o)
Amazing creatures. good pov, TFS
Donna:o)
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