It will probably never catch on as a nickname for the Galápagos Islands, given the enormous variety of weird animals already known to live in and around the Pacific archipelago giant tortoises, flightless cormorants, blue-footed boobies and hordes of iguanas, to name just a few. No pink iguanas, though, until one was spotted two decades ago by rangers on the rugged island of Volcan Wolf. It wasn't clear at the time whether it was just a mutant variant of the iguanas Charles Darwin spotted during his 1835 visit. It took DNA analysis by a team of Italian scientists to settle the matter this year. The conclusion, published in January in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: the pink iguana is a species in its own right and probably a more ancient one than the more common yellow variety. That was the first question on scientists' minds. The second one, all too obvious these days: Is it endangered? No word on that yet.
The Top 10 Everything of 2009
- Top 10 Albums
- Top 10 Animal Stories
- Top 10 Apologies
- Top 10 Art Exhibitions
- Top 10 Awkward Moments
- Top 10 Best Business Deals
- Top 10 Breakups
- Top 10 Buzzwords
- Top 10 Children's Books
- Top 10 Crime Stories
- Top 10 Editorial Cartoons
- Top 10 Facebook Stories
- Top 10 Fashion Faux Pas
- Top 10 Fashion Moments
- Top 10 Feuds
- Top 10 Fiction Books
- Top 10 Fleeting Celebrities
- Top 10 Gadgets
- Top 10 Green Ideas
- Top 10 Heroes
- Top 10 iPhone Apps
- Top 10 Late-Night Jokes
- Top 10 Magazine Covers
- Top 10 Medical Breakthroughs
- Top 10 Movie Performances
- Top 10 Movies
- Top 10 New Species
- Top 10 News Stories
- Top 10 Nonfiction Books
- Top 10 Oddball News Stories
- Top 10 Pariahs
- Top 10 Pictures of the Year
- Top 10 Plays and Musicals
- Top 10 Political Gaffes
- Top 10 Quotes
- Top 10 Religion Stories
- Top 10 Scandals
- Top 10 Scientific Discoveries
- Top 10 Songs
- Top 10 Sports Moments
- Top 10 T-Shirt-Worthy Slogans
- Top 10 TV Ads
- Top 10 TV Episodes
- Top 10 TV Series
- Top 10 Tweets
- Top 10 Underreported Stories
- Top 10 Untruths
- Top 10 Video Games
- Top 10 Viral Videos
- Top 10 Worst Biz Deals
TIME charts the highs and lows of the past year in 50 wide-ranging lists