Floreana giant tortoise reintroduced to Galápagos island after almost 200 years

The Floreana giant tortoise. By the time Charles Darwin landed on the island in 1835, the subspecies was already in its death throes. Photograph: Carlos Espinosa /PR

Giant tortoises, the life-giving engineers of remote small island ecosystems, are plodding over the Galápagos island of Floreana for the first time in more than 180 years.

The Floreana giant tortoise (Chelonoidis niger niger), a subspecies of the giant tortoise once found across the Galápagos, was driven to extinction in the 1840s by whalers who removed thousands from the volcanic island to provide a living larder during their hunting voyages.