Which animal can live without food for 100 years

Compared to most animals, humans have the capacity to live much longer lives. Some animals, however, not only outlive humans but can actually survive longer than multiple generations of people. Earth.com presents: the longest-living animals on the planet.

Ocean quahog

Also known as Arctica Islandica, this edible clam species is well-known for their long lifespans. One specimen found in the Icelandic seabed, which was then estimated to be around 405, turned out to be 507 years old.

Greenland Shark

The longest living vertebrate on the planet is the Greenland shark, with a lifespan of 400 years. These sharks do not even reach sexual maturity until they are 150 years old, according to a recent study. The researchers dated one ancient shark which lived as many as 512 years.

Koi

Some varieties of koi fish live longer than others. A koi living in the long-established waters of Japan, its historical home, can easily live to be over 70. A koi carp known as “Hanako” lived  to be 225 years old in Japan. In artificial ponds, it is still not unusual for a koi fish to reach over 40 years old.

Bowhead Whale

Also known as the Arctic whale, bowheads are the longest living mammals on Earth.

These whales can live to be over 200 years old, with the oldest known bowhead reaching the age of 211. Researchers have found that part of what enables these animals to live for so long is that they rarely succumb to cancer and disease.

Giant Tortoise

With an average lifespan of over 100 years, giant tortoises are very resilient creatures. Their long lives can be partially attributed to an extremely slow metabolism. Some giant tortoises such as Galapagos tortoises can go over a year without food or water. An Aldabra giant tortoise that died in India in 2006 was believed to be 255 years old.

Red sea urchin

Located primarily along the west coast of North America, red sea urchins prefer rocky, shallow ocean floor waters. They move around slowly, using their sharp spines as stilts. Red sea urchins often live beyond 30 years, and in optimal conditions have even lived to be over 200 years old.

Cockatoo

Cockatoos have an average lifespan of 50-70 years in proper conditions, so bringing a cockatoo into a happy and healthy home is most likely a lifetime commitment. Umbrella Cockatoos can live 80 years or more when properly cared for. A legendary sulphur-crested cockatoo in Australia known as Cocky Bennett died at the ripe old age of 120.

Geoduck

Also known as mud ducks or king clams, geoducks can reach up to 10 pounds. They are also one of the world’s longest living animals and the oldest known geoduck clam lived to be 168 years old.

Asian Elephant

Asian elephants are slightly smaller than African elephants and are native to India and Southeast Asia. They live to be an average age of 70 years old. Lin Wang, a famous elephant at the Taipei Zoo who had once served in the Chinese army, lived the longest life of any Asian elephant in captivity and died at age 86.

Tuatara

With an average lifespan of 60 years, these reptiles can actually live to be over 100. They mature so slowly that they continue to grow larger for the first 35 years of life. This unique species dates back over 200 million years, with characteristics largely unchanged since the Jurassic Period.

Some animals need to eat multiple times a day to get the energy required to survive. For example, an elephant can eat 375 pounds of vegetation every day. However, other animals have adapted to go long periods without food. They achieve this feat in various ways, from reducing their energy requirements to digesting their own body parts.

Reptiles

A variety of snakes, including vipers and constrictors, can survive for weeks, sometimes months, without eating. Because snakes are carnivores and hunt live prey, they cannot snack or slake their hunger pains by eating vegetation. Instead, they slow their metabolic rate by up to 70 percent when necessary to survive. Despite this huge reduction in metabolic activity, the snake will continue to grow. When the snake is able to find prey, he will gorge, potentially taking days to digest what he caught. Crocodiles are capable of going for more than a year without eating.

Insects and Arachnids

Cockroaches can survive without their head. A headless roach is capable of living for weeks. It is not the loss of its head that kills the roach, but the fact that he is unable to eat. With or without his head, the roach cannot go for more than a few weeks without eating, despite being cold-blooded -- a common trait among the most impressive food abstainers. Tarantulas, too, can last for more than a month without eating. Provided they are healthy, one meal can sustain a tarantula for several weeks without showing any ill effects.

Fish

While humans, dogs, elephants and a variety of other warm-blooded animals eat daily, other animals have adapted a famine and feast approach to food. Great white sharks can go for weeks without eating a single thing. The longer one of these apex predators goes without food, the more opportunistic their hunting strategies become. The record holder for the longest fast, though, is the lungfish. The lungfish may hibernate for up to four years. During this period, he will begin to digest his own muscle tissues. This process, a type of auto-cannibalism, is called autophagy.

Winter Fasting

The emperor penguin is one of the few warm-blooded animals to go for weeks without eating. Due to the harsh winters they face on the Antarctic ice, they have adapted to survive without food for up to two months while traveling to open water or broken ice in which to hunt. However, unlike crocodiles and snakes, they do not compensate by slowing down their metabolism. Instead, they survive on the fat reserves built up during the last period of feeding. Hibernating mammals, such as bears and hedgehogs, also build up deposits of fat to see them through months of winter sleep.

References

• Sea World: Elephants
• Live Science: How Snakes Survive Months Without Food
• Scientific American: Fact or Fiction? A Cockroach Can Live without Its Head
• PBS: Shark Attack
• PBS: Supersize Crocs
• Ask Nature: Surviving Extended Confinement -- Lungfish
• The British Tarantula Society: Keeping Tarantulas -- The Basics
• Polar Bears International: Hibernation and Denning

Photo Credits

• Comstock/Stockbyte/Getty Images

Writer Bio

Simon Foden has been a freelance writer and editor since 1999. He began his writing career after graduating with a Bachelors of Arts degree in music from Salford University. He has contributed to and written for various magazines including "K9 Magazine" and "Pet Friendly Magazine." He has also written for Dogmagazine.net.

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