Tomas Tortoise

To learn a bit more about me and other tortoises, you may enjoy reading the Five Fun Facts below. I have made a word search puzzle for you, and lastly there is a very special colouring sheet featuring Zeb, Oki, me, and baby sea turtles that are hurrying into the ocean.

Fun facts about Tomas and tortoises:

• Tomas is an Aldabra Atoll giant tortoise! There are just two species of giant tortoise and the other one lives on the Galápagos Islands, which are in the Pacific Ocean, west of South America. Tomas’s Atoll, or coral reef, lies around the Outer Islands of the Seychelles in the Indian Ocean.
• Giant tortoises have a large hard shell to protect their soft bodies. Their necks are very long so they can reach the juicy leaves on high tree branches! Their limbs are short and they have rather flat feet that serve them very well when walking on the sand.
• Giant tortoises do not live in groups. However, males and females meet to mate between February and May. The male tortoises bellow very loudly and run after the females as fast as their little legs can carry them! Tomas once ran so fast, he kept on running all the way into the sea! Then he felt a bit silly.
• The females lay as many as 25 eggs in a nest on the ground. Unfortunately the eggs are sometimes eaten by predators, but the babies that survive hatch after eight months and during the green season so there is plenty to eat.
• Giant tortoises live for up to 120 years and some are known to have lived for over 250 years! Tomas is 101, but he told Zeb and Oki that he was 21 when they first met him!