Giant Galapagos tortoise, Lonesome George, looking his most majestic By Scientific American, adapted by Newsela staff Nov.

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1 Giant Galapagos tortoise, Lonesome George, looking his most majestic By Scientific American, adapted by Newsela staff Nov. 12, :00 AM Lonesome George, the last Pinta Island giant tortoise, in a photo taken at the Charles Darwin Research Station in December The American Museum of Natural History will be welcoming a newcomer to its array of extinct animals. Among the fossils of long-gone gigantic sloths and knee-high horses, the newcomer is Lonesome George, the last known giant tortoise from Pinta Island. For four decades the 100-year-old reptile served as a conservation icon on Ecuador s Galpagos Archipelago. The Galpagos is a group of islands famous for their wide variety of animals. George s subspecies was hunted for meat and tortoise oil, and nearly vanished in the 1900s. George was its only survivor, and despite several attempts to get him to reproduce with giant tortoises from similar subspecies, he died without descendants on June 24, 2012; hence his nickname, Lonesome George. What remains of Lonesome George s memory is a lifelike mount at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City. The exhibition was designed by a team of taxidermists. These experts take parts of the animal s body to create a statue that looks like the actual animal. The result is George looking his most majestic with neck outstretched and shell polished. 1

2 We Just Witnessed Extinction Chance brought him to the museum. Fausto Llerena, George s trainer since 1983, found the tortoise sprawled out dead one morning. On that same day, a group of conservationists had just arrived at Santa Cruz Island for a citizen science workshop. Santa Cruz Island, where George drew millions of visitors over his 40-year stay there, is one of four inhabited islands in the Galpagos chain. The other more than three-dozen islands and islets are untouched wilderness preserves. When Llerena informed the Galpagos National Park Service of George s passing, they shared the sad news with their guests, many of whom began to cry. For Eleanor Sterling, a chief conservation scientist at the AMNH who arrived on the island that day, the next 24 hours were filled with disbelief. We just witnessed extinction, she says. Galpagos tortoises can live up to 150 years, so George s death at 100 years came unexpectedly. Sterling and the other conservationists, many of whom were members of the Galpagos Conservancy, jumped into action. They shifted gears from conducting citizen science to making arrangements for examining George s dead body. A veterinarian was called to conduct the necropsy. They split George s shell in half with a chainsaw and determined that he had died of natural causes. Next the group needed to protect George s carcass from the 100-degree Fahrenheit tropical heat that could rot his body. After 36 hours, the bulky, 165-pound (75-kilogram) tortoise was put in a large freezer, safely wrapped and mummified. A Very Special Preservation Members of both the conservancy and the Galpagos National Park System decided the best option was to preserve George via taxidermy. They believed that a lifelike display of the extinct giant tortoise could help with conservation efforts. But the job to restore George s carcass would require a very special taxidermist. Sterling recommended George Dante for the job. Dante had done the taxidermy preservation work on 8.2-foot-tall (2.5 meters) Alaskan brown bears and other creatures for the museum s North American Mammal Hall in Preserving George would be his biggest challenge since that project. After months of trying to get special travel permits and making the travel arrangements of shipping a frozen carcass, George finally arrived at Dante s office. First, Dante defrosted the corpse. After George s body thawed he measured every centimeter of the tortoise before molding a replica of the body. He filled the mold with foam, which would eventually become the base on which he would add a water-based clay to create George s features. On top 2

3 of that clay he would stretch out George s skin intact in one whole piece. His biggest challenge was working on a species that had never been mounted before. Not surprisingly, taxidermy-supply companies do not make parts for extinct giant tortoises. The beauty is that there s no handbook on how to do it, he says. Specially Made Eyes Shine Dante was well aware he was working on what he had dubbed the world s pet. As such, he knew there was no room for error. Every centimeter had to be scientifically accurate, from his saddle-back shell to the missing toenail on his left front foot. We couldn t just look at this as a project of mounting a Galpagos tortoise. Dante says. We are re-creating this character. He checked hundreds of pictures to recreate every wrinkle in George s skin. He drew green stains around George s mouth and neck to make it appear as if the tortoise had just finished grazing. And he had a glass company create the world s first pair of custom-made glass tortoise eyeballs for George, which meant visiting a local zoo to observe the intricate colors of a live tortoise s eyes. When it came time for a pose, Dante asked for an opinion from Fausto Llerena who was George s trainer. Llerena advised Dante to portray George in a familiar stance, with his neck outstretched in dominance and yet with his tail tucked submissively. Llerena, who is also a well-known wood carver, sent Dante a hand-carved wooden tortoise as a sign of gratitude for restoring his friend of 40 years. Not So Lonesome George On Sept. 18, 2014, after 500 hours of labor conducted over more than a year, Dante was finally ready to present George to the museum and the people who helped bring him there. Among the audience at George s exhibition were several people who were also present for his death, including Gibbs and Sterling. They were all pleasantly surprised with Dante s work. You could see the look in his eye, and you could see the pose, Sterling says. He brought Lonesome George back to life. Surrounded by other species lost to time, George looked a little less lonesome. But the difference between him and his neighboring specimens was not lost on anyone who attended the unveiling. The other animals in the hall were driven to extinction by changing climates. George and his kind disappeared because of man. 3

4 Editor s Note: Lonesome George is on temporary display at the museum until Jan. 4, 2015, after which he will be shipped and put on display in Quito, Ecuador. Reproduced with permission. Copyright 2014 Scientific American ( a division of Nature America, Inc. All rights reserved. 4

5 Quiz 1. The article introduces Lonesome George by: (a) stating the reason behind his pet name (b) describing his inability to produce any offspring (c) drawing comparisons with other extinct turtles (d) explaining why his death is drawing so much attention 2. Why was so much effort put in to display George at the American Museum of Natural History? (a) His death came as a shock and park officials didn t know what else to do. (b) He was the last survivor of a now extinct species of giant tortoise. (c) Museum officials were excited to add another extinct animal. (d) He was a conservation icon for the past 40 years. 3. Which of the following does the author use to show that, in the end, Dante s efforts to recreate George were a success? (a) words of appreciation from the audience at George s unveiling (b) description of all the detailing that Dante took care of (c) a list of people Dante consulted to complete the work (d) a mention of the resources used in the process 4. What purpose does the section We Just Witnessed Extinction serve in the article? (a) It helps explain the cause of George s death. (b) It speculates on reasons George may have died. (c) It describes the popularity of George when he was alive. (d) It shows the efforts made to preserve George s remains. 5

6 Answer Key 1. The article introduces Lonesome George by: (a) stating the reason behind his pet name (b) describing his inability to produce any offspring (c) drawing comparisons with other extinct turtles (d) explaining why his death is drawing so much attention 2. Why was so much effort put in to display George at the American Museum of Natural History? (a) His death came as a shock and park officials didn t know what else to do. (b) He was the last survivor of a now extinct species of giant tortoise. (c) Museum officials were excited to add another extinct animal. (d) He was a conservation icon for the past 40 years. 3. Which of the following does the author use to show that, in the end, Dante s efforts to recreate George were a success? (a) words of appreciation from the audience at George s unveiling (b) description of all the detailing that Dante took care of (c) a list of people Dante consulted to complete the work (d) a mention of the resources used in the process 4. What purpose does the section We Just Witnessed Extinction serve in the article? (a) It helps explain the cause of George s death. (b) It speculates on reasons George may have died. (c) It describes the popularity of George when he was alive. (d) It shows the efforts made to preserve George s remains. 6