Tuataras and The Question of Living Fossils

Seen here through the glass wall of the Southland Museum's tuatarium on New Zealand's South Island, Henry the tuatara has been around since the late 19th century. His lineage is much older — the species predates dinosaurs. Credit: G. Tarlach. New Zealand's tuataras prove the old adage "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" like few other animals on the planet (coelacanth, I'm looking at you). While paleontologists have long differed over the animal's "living fossil" status, new research suggests the tuatara lineage got its groove some 240 million years ago and never lost it. Sphenodon punctatus, commonly known as the tuatara, has been puzzling science as long as science has been aware of it: Back in 1831, the animal was initially described as a lizard. Tuataras eventually got their own special spot on the reptile family tree as the last living species of a once-diverse group known as the Rhynchocephalia. These reptiles evolved sometime in the front end of the Triassic, before even dinosaurs were really on the scene. In the wild today, tuataras turn up only in New Zealand and, more specifically, only on a handful of islands off its coast. It's yet another long-lived lineage that's now critically endangered thanks to human activity, including the importation to New Zealand of alien species such as dogs and stoats, who find tuataras totally tasty. The best way to see the animals is to visit the tuatarium at the Southland Museum in Invercargill, New Zealand's southernmost city. Several dozen apparently content tuataras hang out there, including the famous Henry, who is probably around 120 years old. By the way, he's still hale and hearty enough to get with the tuatara ladies on occasion. Long live Henry.