The Gran Canaria giant tortoise (''Centrochelys vulcanica'') is an extinct species of cryptodire
turtle
Turtles are an order of reptiles known as Testudines, characterized by a special shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Cryptodira (hidden necked t ...
in the family Testudinidae endemic to the island of
Gran Canaria
Gran Canaria (, ; ), also Grand Canary Island, is the third-largest and second-most-populous island of the Canary Islands, an archipelago off the Atlantic coast of Northwest Africa which is part of Spain. the island had a population of that ...
This is one of the two described species of giant tortoises that inhabited the Canary Islands from the
Miocene
The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...
to the upper
Pleistocene
The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed in ...
. The other species is '' C. burchardi'', from the island of
Tenerife
Tenerife (; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands. It is home to 43% of the total population of the archipelago. With a land area of and a population of 978,100 inhabitants as of Janu ...
.
''C. vulcanica'' was described by López-Jurado & Mateo in 1993. It is believed that the ancestors of these two species of giant tortoises reached the Canary Islands from
North Africa
North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...
. The majority of ''C. vulcanica'' fossils are of eggs and nests ranging in age from the
Miocene
The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...
until
Pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58Lanzarote and Fuerteventura; however, these eggs have not yet been properly described or named. The Fuerteventura fossils have been linked to ''C. burchardi'', but this identification is uncertain, and has been challenged.The Recently Extinct Plants and Animals Database Extinct Reptiles: Geochelone /ref>
See also
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List of extinct animals
This page features lists of extinct species, organisms that have become extinct, either in the wild or completely disappeared from Earth.
In actual theoretical practice, a species not definitely located in the wild in the last fifty years of cur ...
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List of African animals extinct in the Holocene
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby unio ...
*
List of extinct animals of Europe
This list of European animals extinct in the Holocene features animals known to have become extinct in the last 12,000 years on the European continent and its surrounding islands.
Dependent territories of European countries in other continents, l ...
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Island gigantism
Island gigantism, or insular gigantism, is a biological phenomenon in which the size of an animal species isolated on an island increases dramatically in comparison to its mainland relatives. Island gigantism is one aspect of the more general Fos ...