Bubbles The Donkey Is 60: Meet The Oldest Animals In The World - BBC

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You probably wouldn't put sloths, donkeys and fish in the same category, but these creatures all have something very special in common.

They're some of the oldest animals in the world! They have defied the odds, living to unimaginable ages.

In fact, one tortoise is believed to be almost 200 years old. Imagine that!

Read on to find out more.

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Bubbles the donkey

A donkey called Bubbles has just turned 60!

The animal is believed to have been born in 1959. The average life-span of a donkey is 25-30 years, but Bubbles has managed to live twice as long as that!

She celebrated her special day with carrots and a cake.

Paula the sloth

One lucky sloth gained popularity earlier this year after she turned 50-years-old!

Paula, who lives in Halle Zoo in Germany, recently made her way into the Guinness Book of Records after she was named the oldest known sloth of her kind.

The two-toed animal arrived at the zoo back in 1971. Her keepers reckon she was at least two years old when she got to Germany from South America and for more than 20 years and she was previously thought that the sloth was a he!

They only discovered that Paula was a female in 1995 when she had an ultrasound scan.

Two-toed sloths have a life expectancy of around 20 years when they're in the world, and can reach between 30 and 40 years old in zoos.

Paula is said to be quite energetic for her age which is pretty impressive - she's said to be around 90 in human years!

Jonathan the tortoise

Experts think that Jonathan the giant tortoise is more than 160 years old! In fact, he's thought to have turned a mind-blowing 187-years-old this year..

The slow-moving reptile is thought to be the oldest land animal in the world and he's got plenty of wrinkles to show for it!

He's originally from the Seychelles, but it's a mystery how he arrived on the remote Atlantic Ocean island of St. Helena, where he's lived for the last 100 years or so.

Jonathan likes to eat carrots, lettuce, cucumber, apples and pears.

When he was younger he was known for disrupting croquet matches and for going under tables at tea parties!

Fatou the gorilla

Fatou the gorilla lives at Berlin Zoo in Germany.

She is believed to have been born in 1957 in the wild, making her the oldest living gorilla in the world.

The 62-year-old ape was brought to France from West Africa by a sailor in 1959 and was later moved to Berlin Zoo.

The bigmouth buffalo fish

Scientists recently discovered a 112-year-old fish, which they believe to be the oldest freshwater fish ever found.

The bigmouth buffalo was previously thought to live to 26 years old, but scientists have now discovered it can live much longer after studying hundreds of the species.

Between 2011 and 2018, they caught a large number of the fish. They photographed and tagged them before releasing them back in the wild, so the team could measure the changes over time.

Through their studies, scientists found a total of five bigmouth buffalo that were over 100 years old, but one became the 112-year-old record-setter.