Brazilian Giant Tortoise
Chelonoidis denticulatus
- Class
- Reptile
- Rarity
- Rare
- Observations
- 1,000
- Most observed in
- 🇪🇨 Ecuador
- Conservation
- Vulnerable
Description
The yellow-footed tortoise (Chelonoidis denticulatus), also known as the Brazilian giant tortoise, is a species of tortoise in the family Testudinidae and is closely related to the red-footed tortoise (C. carbonarius). It is found in the Amazon Basin of South America. The species name has often been misspelled as denticulata, an error introduced in the 1980s when Chelonoidis was elevated to genus and mistakenly treated as feminine, an error recognized and fixed in 2017. With an average length of 40 cm (15.75 in) and the largest known specimen at 94 cm (37 in), this is the sixth-largest tortoise species on Earth, after the Galapagos tortoise, the Aldabra tortoise, the African spurred tortoise (Geochelone sulcata, typical size 76 cm (30 in)), the leopard tortoise (Stigmochelys pardalis), and the Asian forest tortoise (Manouria emys), typical size 60 cm (23.6 in)).
Summary adapted from the Wikipedia article “Yellow-footed tortoise”.