Colombia has a new claim to scientific fame, and it comes with a pop soundtrack. Researchers have identified a previously unknown genus and species of fossil turtle from the Tatacoa desert in Huila, in the country's south, and named it Shakiremys colombiana — in honour of Shakira.
The fossil was unearthed in 2025 near the town of Villavieja, in a zone of the Tatacoa long known for its rich paleontological record. The find is exceptional for its age, roughly 13 million years, and its condition: researchers recovered the shell plus fragments of the skull, something rarely preserved in turtles this old. A team led by Edwin Cadena of Universidad del Rosario, working with young scientists from the La Tatacoa Natural History Museum, spent weeks on careful extraction before shipping the material to Bogotá for lab analysis.
What they found was a genuine evolutionary hybrid. Shakiremys colombiana belonged to the Podocnemididae family — the group that includes today's freshwater turtles in the Amazon, Orinoco and Magdalena basins — but its anatomy didn't match any known species, earning it a whole new genus. It had adaptations for life in varied aquatic settings and was probably omnivorous, which likely let it share habitat with several other turtle species in what was, during the Middle Miocene, a lush water-rich region rather than the arid badlands visitors see today. The study was published in Papers in Palaeontology.
As for the name: Cadena had made a promise to one day name a standout discovery after Shakira, citing her role in representing Colombia internationally. It's a publicity win for science, too — researchers say the celebrity tie helps draw public interest to the country's natural history.
For travellers, the real takeaway is the Tatacoa desert itself. This reddish-grey semi-desert is one of South America's most productive fossil sites, having yielded giant crocodiles, prehistoric sloths and massive turtles, alongside some of the darkest skies in Colombia for stargazing. With this discovery making international headlines, the small museums and fossil sites around Villavieja are likely to see more curious visitors — and they're well worth the detour if you're heading through Huila.
