He's over 100 years old, but his sex life is the stuff of legend. Diego the Tortoise is quite the ladies' man, and his exploits have helped save his species from extinction.
Diego, a Galapagos giant tortoise, has fathered an estimated 800 offspring, almost single-handedly rebuilding the species' population on their native island, Espanola, the southernmost in the Galapagos Archipelago.
"He's a very sexually active male reproducer. He's contributed enormously to repopulating the island," said Washington Tapia, a tortoise preservation specialist at Galapagos National Park.
Diego is a Chelonoidis hoodensis, a species found in the wild only on Espanola.
The island is one of the oldest in the Galapagos, the Pacific archipelago made famous by Charles Darwin's studies of its breathtaking biodiversity.
Around 50 years ago, there were only two males and 12 females of Diego's species alive on Espanola, and they were too spread out to reproduce. Back when he was a young-un.
He has done more than any other tortoise to turn that around -- with the help of his mates, of course.
Diego lives at a tortoise breeding center on Santa Cruz Island, one of the largest in the Galapagos.
He is the dominant male of the three assigned to repopulate Espanola.
He shares his enclosure with six females, his partners in the task of saving their species. Given the way he behaves, he is either sneaky or can run pretty fast. For a tortoise.
Tough work, but some tortoise has to do it.
- Mysterious Casanova -
On a cloudy morning with chilly wind, Diego timidly peeks his head out from his thick shell, then slowly plods toward some leaves for breakfast.
"Look, look! He came out. How pretty," said a young girl as she looked on.
Diego weighs about 80 kilograms (175 pounds), is nearly 90 centimeters (35 inches) long and 1.5 meters (five feet) tall if he really stretches his legs and neck.
He has a mysterious, globe-trotting background to go with his reputation as a Casanova.
Diego was found at the San Diego Zoo -- hence his name -- after Chelonoidis hoodensis was identified as a species and an international campaign was launched to find more of the rare tortoises.
"We don't know exactly how or when he arrived in the United States. He must have been taken from Espanola sometime between 1900 and 1959 by a scientific expedition," said Tapia.
After being located at the zoo in California, Diego was brought back to the Galapagos in 1976 and put in the captive breeding program.
- The 40% dad -
Little did scientists realize just how effective he was, until six years ago.
"We did a genetic study and we discovered that he was the father of nearly 40 percent of the offspring released into the wild on Espanola," Tapia told AFP.
In all, around 2,000 tortoises have been released on the small island. Thanks to the program, the species is no longer facing extinction.
"I wouldn't say (the species) is in perfect health, because historical records show there probably used to be more than 5,000 tortoises on the island. But it's a population that's in pretty good shape -- and growing, which is the most important," said Tapia.
Of the 15 species of giant tortoise known to have originated in the Galapagos, three have gone extinct -- victims of 18th-century pirates who plundered the islands' fragile ecosystem.
Diego's species has also been introduced on the island of Santa Fe, where a genetically similar one, Chelonoidis spp, disappeared more than 150 years ago.
Not all critically endangered tortoises rise to the challenge as Diego has.
Hopes for another threatened species, Chelonoidis abingdoni, faded when its last known survivor died in 2012 at more than 100 years old.
Known as Lonesome George, he had refused for years to breed in captivity.
Interim Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile warned against perusing the documents released in the latest DNC hack, alleging that they could have viruses which damage your computer. Sounds like Dem "leaders" either don't understand the magical, mysterious interwebs, or they believe their sycophants can't figure it out. Or both.
Brazile urged caution for anyone attempting to download the documents, "given the potential malware risks." At the same time, she said the hack was carried out by the Russians, particularly the infamous hacker Guccifer 2.0, the same hacker who released DNC documents right before the Democratic National Convention in July, leading to the resignation of Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Resignation? More like beatification.
The DNC is the victim of a crime -- an illegal cyberattack by Russian state-sponsored agents who seek to harm the Democratic Party and progressive groups in an effort to influence the presidential election," Brazile declared in a statement Tuesday. "We have been anticipating that an additional batch of documents stolen by Russian agents would be released." And as we all know, criminal behavior is only allowed by Dem leadership.
#2
Yeah, the sneaky Rooshians prolly let the first batch out without the bugs, but now the unsuspecting capitalists will all fall to their clever trap.
Except all the victims will be the DNC-compliant media, anyways.
Posted by: Bobby ||
09/14/2016 12:34 Comments ||
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[DAWN] LAHORE: A man allegedly strangled his wife for ’honour’ in Gujjarpura early on Monday.
Police claimed Abubakar of Karol Ghatti exchanged harsh words with his wife late on Sunday over suspicion she had a relationship with a neighbour. He later strangled her with a rope.
On Monday morning, Abubakar bundled his wife’s body into an auto rickshaw and planned to throw it into the BRB Canal with the connivance of a friend.
As soon as the men reached near a police checkpost at Manawan they got terrified and fled from the scene leaving the rickshaw behind.
Police claimed they shifted the body to morgue for an appointment with Dr. Quincy and placed in durance vile You have the right to remain silent... both Abubakar and his friend a few hours later.
A murder case was registered against them.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/14/2016 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
He's over 100 years old, but his sex life is the stuff of legend. Diego the Tortoise is quite the ladies' man, and his exploits have helped save his species from extinction.
Interim Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile warned against perusing the documents released in the latest DNC hack, alleging that they could have viruses which damage your computer.
[DAWN] LAHORE: A man allegedly strangled his wife for ’honour’ in Gujjarpura early on Monday.
