How long our animal friends live

We cannot say exactly how long different animals live, as we can about the lifespan (length of time from birth to death) of men and women. we know the age to which men and women live because, in most countries, the date of their birth is recorded in an official register and the date of their death is also recorded.

Animals have no such records except for a few prize animals like race-horses, dogs and cattle.

Many domestic animals who are kept as pets or as farm animals live longer than those in the wild, because they are cared for (looked after) and are free from predators (animals that kill and eat other animals).

Among these pets, the tortoise wins the long-life prize. Jonathan who is featured on this page was 176 last year. Another tortoise who was kept as a pet by the Royal Family of Tonga, on island in the South West Pacific Ocean was 189 when he died in 1966.

The elephant, the largest mammal on land has a lifespan of 80 years very much less than the tortoises.

Compare the size of the elephant and the tortoise, and their lifepans. What a difference! As in this case, and in many others, you will read about later on, it is not size that determines the lifespan.

Raja, the Maligawa Tusker who carried the casket with the Sacred Tooth Relic for nearly 50 years at the annual Esala Perahera in Kandy was 75 years old when he died on July 16, 1988. Raja was born in 1913 and in 1937 Maampitiya Disawa gifted him to the Maligawa.

Among animals kept as pets, the dog and the cat have equal lifespans - maximum of 15 years. But some scientists give the dog only 10 years.

There is disagreement among scientists on the lifespan of certain animals, some putting the length of life higher and some lesser.

In the table illustrated here the horse has been given a lifespan of 35 years. But some scientists put it at 20 years.

What about the other animals that serve man? The ox's lifespan is 15 years, but the cow can live up to 20 years. Goats and sheep live up to 15 years and the pig five years more, until 20. The Yak, a type of ox who lives mostly in Tibet and does all the carrying on the snow, has a lifespan of 20 years.

Small as they are, the frog and the squirrel, each can live up to 15 years, almost twice the length of life of rabbits and hares, which is 6 - 8 years.

Among animals in the wild, the rhinoceros has a long life of 50 years, second only to the wild elephant. The hippopotamus lives 40 years followed by the bear who has 35 years. The king of beasts, the lion is way down with 25 years, and the tiger has 20 years. The giraffe, tall as he is, has only 14 years. Even the monkey has a 15 year lifespan.

The alligator has a long life of 75 years, but some put it as low as 40 for both the alligator and crocodile. When it comes to our feathered friends what bird do you think has the longest lifespan? The parrot has a long life, as long as 50, but he is surpassed by his more glamorous cousin, the cockatoo.

The owl, eagle and the cockatoo all have a lifespan of 60 years, which is the longest among birds. Unlike the eagle, the hawk has a short life of only 15 years, the same as the hen. The ostrich and the pigeon, one so large and the other, so small, both have equal lifespan 30 years.

According to one estimate the feathered friends we see in abundance, daily, the crows live 100 years longer.

If you are rearing gold fish as pets or as onarmental fish, you can expect them to live up to 10 years the most, even with the best of care. Given is a list of too sets of estimated lifespan (not recorded but estimated) and the average for each animal. The two tables show the disagreement among scientists.

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Number of years some animals

and reptiles live

Tortoise 200 - -

Elephant 80 - 50

Rhinoceros - 50

Hippopotamus - 40

Alligator 75 - 40

Crocodile - 40

Camel 40 - 28

Horse 35 - 20

Bear - 35

Lion 25 - 20

Tiger - 20

Pig 20- -

Yak - 20

Cow 20 - 20

Goat 15 - 15

Dog 15 - 10

Cat 15 - 15

Sheep 15 - 15

Giraffe - 14

Monkey - 15

Squirrel - 15

Rabbit 08 - 06

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Jonathan, the Grand Old Tortoise

This is Jonathan, the grand old tortoise living in St. Helena, a remote island in the South Atlantic ocean. He is 176 years old. He is the oldest inhabitant in St. Helena and is claimed to be the oldest living tortoise. He could well be the oldest living being on Earth!

St. Helena is a very small island with about 4,200 residents, but the island's name is famous because Napoleon Bonaparte, the French leader was exiled to St. Helena after he was defeated by the English in 1815. He died in St. Helena in 1821 and was buried there.

Jonathan is a national treasure and is owned by the Government. He lives on plantation owned by the Governor of St. Helena.

Jonathan's life is recorded after 1882, in which year he was brought to St. Helena along with two other tortoises from the Seychelles, a group of islands in the Indian Ocean, north of Madagascar. You must have learned about these islands in your Geography lesson in Grade 6. The other two tortoises who accompanied Jonathan died while he has survived until this year (2009).

A spokesman for the island's Tourist Board has said that Jonathan was at least 50 years old when he arrived in St. Helena in 1882. A photograph taken in 1900 showing Jonathan nibbling grass watched by a guard and a prisoner of the Boer War (1899-1902) helped establish Jonathan's age as 176 in 2008. When this photograph was taken in 2008 he was still munching grass - the diet that has given him this long life. His caretaker says Jonathan is still very active despite his age and loves attention. He has five other tortoises, two males and three females, as companions.

According to the Guinness World Records the record for the oldest living animal was a tortoise from Madagascar name Tui Malila given to the Royal Family of Tonga (an island in the South West Pacific ocean) by Captain James Cook, which died in 1966 aged 189.

The tortoise is believed to live, under favourable conditions, upto 200 years.

- Sumana Saparamadu