Snack time

Grabbing a bite to eat is more of an ordeal when you are a 90 year old Galapagos tortoise. On our visit to the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo yesterday, we witnessed this large male tortoise slowly make his way to a banana which was about 15 feet away. It wasn’t an easy journey. These land based reptiles lack some of the underwater grace of their marine cousins, turtles. After a few false starts, this big guy managed to get over a rock that was in his way and make it within inches of the prize. Only I guess that last step was the hardest because when he finally plunked down, he was still just short of the banana. Not to be outdone, he stretched out his neck and made a few chomps in vain before finally snagging the fruit and bringing it a bit closer to feast on it – or smear it over his face, it depends on how you look at it.

This tortoise arrived in Bermuda in the 1930s and was one of the first Galapagos tortoises to be bred in captivity.