Amazon Aurora CREATE_TIME in INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES is NULL
This was the response from AWS - they agree using the TABLE_COMMENT column is the way forward. I can also confirm we have successfully implemented this solution.


  Hello,
  
  Thank you for contacting AWS premium support. My name is Vidyadhar and
  I am glad to assist you on this case.
  
  From the case description, I understand that you noticed only null
  values in create_time column in information_schema.tables. You were
  removing old tables based on the values inside this column in MySQL.
  Now, you would like to know reason for not showing up creation time in
  Aurora and alternatives to achieve your requirement.
  
  Just to let you know, there is a known bug in MySQL related to the
  same where create_time will be null for partitioned columns. This has
  been fixed in MySQL 5.6.25 version. Please look into below link for
  reference.
  
  https://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=69990
  
  In aurora this column will be NULL for all tables including
  partitioned tables. This has been already notified to the service
  team. Also, there is no workaround to this available in Aurora for
  now.
  
  It is best option to utilize the table comment session as a work
  around to note the time of table creation and proceed accordingly with
  table deletion. You can look into TABLE_COMMENT column in
  information_schema.tables. Please refer to below example which might
  be helpful.

MySQL [test]&gt; create table S1(id int) comment='2017-09-21 15:53:51';
Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.02 sec)

MySQL [test]&gt;  show create table S1\G
*************************** 1. row ***************************
       Table: S1 Create Table: CREATE TABLE `S1` (   `id` int(11) DEFAULT NULL ) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1
COMMENT='2017-09-21 15:53:51' 1 row in set (0.00 sec)

MySQL [test]&gt; select TABLE_SCHEMA,TABLE_NAME,TABLE_COMMENT from
information_schema.tables where table_schema='test' and
table_name='S1';
+--------------+------------+---------------------+ 
| TABLE_SCHEMA | TABLE_NAME | TABLE_COMMENT       |
+--------------+------------+---------------------+ 
| test         | S1         | 2017-09-21 15:53:51 |
+--------------+------------+---------------------+ 
1 row in set (0.01 sec)

  
  I truly apologize for the inconvenience caused. Aurora service team is
  working hard to add features and fixing bugs. As of now, I am unable
  to provide any ETA but definitely this will be fixed in future
  versions.
  
  I hope this information is helpful. Please feel free to reach me if
  you have any further questions or concerns.
  
  Have a great day!