Lonesome George c. 1912-2012

It has just been reported that Lonesome George, the Galapagos Tortoise who was considered to be the last of is kind, has died.

the last remaining tortoise of his kind and a conservation icon, died on Sunday of unknown causes, the Galapagos National Park said. He was thought to be about 100 years old.

Lonesome George was found in 1972 and had become a symbol of Ecuador's Galapagos Islands, which attracted some 180,000 visitors last year.

"This morning the park ranger in charge of looking after the tortoises found Lonesome George, his body was motionless," the head of the Galapagos National Park, Edwin Naula, told Reuters. "His life cycle came to an end."

George is not the last of a species, but he is the last of a subspecies. A necropsy will be performed to try to determine a cause of death. George, roughly a century old, was not particularly old for his kind.

For the record, Charles Darwin dies in 1882.

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Photo by doriana del sarto