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11/17/2005: "did you know?"
...i read about harriet on an australian blog i read and just had to share...
"Harriet is an ancient Galįpagos tortoise at the Australia Zoo. Based on DNA testing, she is believed to have been born around 1830, and is thus the oldest known animal alive today.
It was originally thought that Harriet was first captured by Charles Darwin in 1835 on the Galapagos Islands. As the tortoises were then dinner plate sized it is estimated they would have been six years old.
However, this story is most likely apocryphal. Though Darwin caught three tortoises and took them home to Britain aboard the HMS Beagle, genetic tests inticate that Harriet belongs to a sub-species endemic to one of the Galapagos Islands that Darwin never visted.
For over a century, Harriet was actually mistaken to be a male, and thus named Harry.
On November 15, 2005, her 175th birthday was celebrated at the Australia Zoo."
...then i had to look up the word apocryphal:
a·poc·ry·phal adj. Of questionable authorship or authenticity.
...which made me think of Methuselah, the 600 pound Galapagos Tortoise who lives at Reptile Gardens in Rapid City, SD. Methuselah was born in 1881 and is South Dakota's oldest resident. my mom and youngest sister went to his 120th birthday party.
