Turtle riddle

Turtle occupies a very important position in the history of China civilization, forming a long-standing "turtle culture". There are records of turtles in many ancient books and history books. For example, Shan Hai Jing, one of the three wonderful books in ancient times, records a mysterious turtle, which is called "the turtle with a bird's head and a bird's tail", and "not deaf can be regarded as the bottom". In other words, wearing the bird's head, eagle's mouth and snake's tail of this turtle means "no deafness can cure cocoon", which is probably the earliest record of turtle's disease prevention and health care function. The ancients believed that turtles had spirituality. In the Book of Rites, turtles are regarded as four spirits alongside dragons, phoenixes and unicorns. Tortoise shell is also often used to predict good luck or bad luck, and to predict the future. In Yi Shu Ji, turtles are classified by age. "The turtle is a thousand years old, living for five thousand years is called a turtle, and living for ten thousand years is called a turtle." There is a saying that the tortoise is five thousand years old and the tortoise is ten thousand years old.

Looking at China's ancient books and traditional culture, turtles have the characteristics of longevity and spirituality, representing good luck and longevity. There is a folk saying that "a thousand-year-old turtle is a thousand-year-old turtle" to describe the longevity of turtles. Even today, the view that the tortoise is the longest-lived animal on earth is still deeply rooted in people's hearts. So, is the tortoise's life really like the legendary "chitose, long live"? Actually, it's not like this. This is more symbolic. Today, Mr. Turtle will talk about this issue for the reference of interested friends.

1. Will the tortoise really live for a thousand or ten thousand years?

The "God Tortoise" and "Spirit Tortoise" recorded in ancient books for thousands of years or even immortality are obviously myths and legends, which can be understood as the ancient people's beautiful yearning for health and longevity. But the data is not reliable, and it is impossible to infer the life of turtles. In reality, turtles can't live that long. So what is their longest life span?

At present, the longest-lived turtle with reliable data records is the Galapagos elephant turtle. This is the largest turtle in the world, and its original population is only distributed in the Galapagos Islands of Ecuador. Because of its strong legs and feet, huge size and elephant-like shape, it is named like a turtle. Their life span is generally high, and it is common to exceed 100 years.

The most typical one is an elephant turtle named Harriet, born in 1830. At the age of 6 (1836), Darwin, who traveled around the world, brought it back to England and kept it as a pet. He died of heart failure in 2006 and lived 176 years old. It was certified as the oldest tortoise reptile by Guinness World Records (please refer to the references for data sources, the same below).

Besides turtles, turtles are also the longest-lived turtles. At present, there are 7 species of sea turtles in the world, mainly distributed in tropical and subtropical regions. The life span of most species of turtles is close to 100 years, and the longest life span recorded in Guinness World Records is 152 years.

Compared with the long-lived turtles, the average life expectancy of freshwater turtles is much smaller, generally around 30 years old. For example, the life span of the three most common pet turtles in the market is about 20-30 years, and that of the Brazilian turtle is about 15-20 years. Others, such as snapping turtles, throats, rims, etc. , are roughly the same, and their average life expectancy is not high. Of course, there are also some cases that record the life span of freshwater turtles as long as 100 years old.