Hundreds of giant tortoises have been reintroduced to the wild in the Galápagos Islands, significantly increasing the population of this rare species.
In 2023, rangers from the Galápagos National Park and staff from the US-based non-profit organization Galápagos Conservancy released about 560 tortoises. These tortoises were part of a program where wild eggs are collected, hatched, and the young are raised in safety before being returned to their islands as adolescents.
Before their release, each tortoise underwent a health check, quarantine for disease, and tagging.
This effort is part of the Iniciativa Galápagos project, which has been working since 2012 to rewild 15 endangered species, including the giant tortoise, iguana, and waved albatross across the 127-island archipelago.
The Galápagos Islands, located 1,000 kilometers from Ecuador's mainland, sit at the intersection of three tectonic plates and are known for their volcanic activity.
Two of the 15 documented giant tortoise subspecies in the Galápagos are extinct, but conservationists are breeding mixed-ancestry tortoises in captivity for future reintroduction.
The Galápagos, home to over 2,000 unique species, inspired Charles Darwin's theory of evolution after his visit in 1835. One tortoise subspecies, Chelonoidis darwini, or the Santiago giant tortoise, was named after Darwin.
Giant tortoises are found only in the Galápagos and some islands in the western Indian Ocean. The Galápagos population, now around 20,000, is recovering from near-extinction due to introduced species like black rats and human hunting in the last century.
Some islands' populations were once reduced to just 10-20 tortoises, but most subspecies now number in the hundreds or thousands.
Weighing about 250 kilograms on average and living over 100 years, giant tortoises benefit from their habit of resting 16 hours a day.
A census by Galápagos Conservancy on Isabela Island, the largest in the archipelago, found approximately 5,000 giant tortoises in the southern region.
"The vulnerability of the tortoises demands our immediate attention and decisive action," said Washington Tapia, the general director of Galápagos Conservancy, in its annual report.
Giant tortoises consume over 225 kilograms of vegetation annually and are considered architects of a healthy ecosystem by Galápagos Conservancy.
The species was famously represented by Lonesome George, the last of his subspecies from Pinta Island, who died in 2012 at about the age of 100.
