What is the Longest-Living Animal?
June 6, 2008The animal with the most birthdays to date goes to a quahog clam plucked from the cold Icelandic waters in 2007. The tiny mollusk would need quite a lung capacity to extinguish the possible 400 candles on its cake.
Some life-span chart toppers include:
- American box turtle — 120 years
- Bowhead whale — 60 to 70 years (though bowheads exceeding 200 years have been reported)
- Elephant — 70 years
- Human — 70 to 80 years
Some animals are born and die in the seeming blink of the eye, including:
- Adult housefly — 4 weeks
- Worker bee — 5 weeks
- Ant (Worker) — ½ year
- Opossum — 1 year
- Ant (Queen) — 3 years
- Rat — 2 to 3 years
Advertisement
