![]() ![]() We’re talking about early creatures here. Indeed, Triops was already a good 150 million years old when T. What? That doesn’t elucidate the matter for you? The very name Triops doesn’t bring images to mind? Well, we have to expect that this ancient life form would be something pretty obscure, given that today’s better known, more charismatic animals, such lions, tigers and rhinos, were not yet a gleam in evolution’s eye when Triops made its debut. Which is why it is such a major biological accomplishment that the world’s oldest known animal species is not 10 million years old, not 50 million, not 100 million, but 220 million years old! Or at any rate, fossils of it indicate that it has not changed its look-its external morphology, as a biologist might say-in all those years. It is a force to be admired, if not actually reckoned with. A creature that does so has shown amazing adaptability and stability. Given that habitats tend to change over time, especially over millions and millions of years (ask a dinosaur), and given that genes tend to mutate whether asked to or not, it is not easy for a species to remain the same for millennium after millennium. This description is a vast simplification of a much more complex process, but for our purposes it will do. Or habitat conditions change, and a species adapts to the new conditions over time, evolving into something new. Genes mutate, physically changing a species until, viola, after enough mutations it becomes a different species altogether. So just what is the world's oldest animal species?īefore answering that question, let’s consider what it means to be an old species. How an obscure little creature has managed to survive for so long that it represents the oldest known living animal If you have a question about the weird and wild animal world, tweet me, leave me a note or photo in the comments below, or find me on Facebook.What Is the World's Oldest Known Animal Species? Weird Animal Question of the Week answers your questions every Saturday. What oldsters did we miss? Let us know or leave another question in the comments. ![]() Here's hoping their population, at least, can soar again. They're also the only flightless parrots in the world. There are a little more than a hundred kakapos left on Earth. The kakapo, a critically endangered parrot native to New Zealand, lives up to 60 years. Not only that, Wisdom is still giving birth to and raising healthy chicks.īig birds like albatrosses tend to live longer, so they mature later and breed less frequently, Klicka says, whereas small birds “are lucky to live five years in the wild." That means they must mature quickly and “produce as many clutches as possible” during breeding season. John Klicka, curator of birds at the Burke Museum in Seattle, says the oldest known wild bird is a 65-year-old Laysan albatross named Wisdom, which has shattered scientists' belief that her species lives to 40. One study in the journal Aging Research Reviews notes a deep-sea sponge from the species Monorhaphis chuni lived to be 11,000 years old. Hardt, author of Sex in the Sea: Our Intimate Connection With Sex-Changing Fish, Romantic Lobsters, Kinky Squid, and Other Salty Erotica of the Deep, says via email.Įstimates of sponge longevity vary quite a bit, but are often in the thousands of years. “People often forget sponges are animals”-and some of them very long-lived animals at that, Marah J. We did some digging and found some animals who are really getting the use out of their senior discount cards. ![]() That’s not bad compared with some adult female mayflies, which live for under five minutes-just long enough to mate and lay eggs. Kidding aside, humans these days live pretty long lives: The average global life expectancy of someone born in 2015 is 71.4 years. "What’s the top ranking of the longest living animal?” Mohamed Larbi Bahou asked Weird Animal Question of the Week. ![]()
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