True or False: Turtles can never die of old age?

Posted by pyxis on April 17, 2003 at 00:07:57:

This question was posed in Readers Digest recently. They use the word turtles. I'm assuming they mean all of chelonia. Here's their answer:
True. Turtles exhibit what's known as negligable senescence. That is, unlike humans, they don't continue to age biologically once their bodies reach maturity. Turtles have even been known to live beyond 150 years without showing any signs of old age (certain fish also share this characteristic). Unfortunately, injury, predation, or disease eventually kills them.

Anyone heard of this before?
It's the one thing I learned today:)

Follow Ups:

• According to recent research, True Nicodemus 04/18/03 (2)
  • chelonians and old age. EJ 04/19/03 (1)
    • Re: chelonians and old age. Nicodemus 04/20/03 (0)
• Re: True or False: Turtles can never die of old age? Blecha 04/17/03 (0)
• Re: True or False: Turtles can never die of old age? hemicide 04/17/03 (1)
  • Re: True or False: Turtles can never die of old age? georgio 04/22/03 (0)
• Re: True or False: Turtles can never die of old age? nathana 04/17/03 (0)

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