As Jonathan describes in Lizards in an Evolutionary Tree (Chapter 8 ) data on anole food preferences are sparse. However, this is a critical element of anole biology that needs to be more thoroughly explored if we are going to understand the diversity of skull shapes (the topic of a future post), nutrition, or energetics in anoles. The question is simple in principle but difficult in practice: do species preferentially eat certain insects? If so, has head shape adapted for the preferential capture or mastication of insects of a particular size or hardness? Do lizards that eat insects of lower “quality” eat more often or move less often? Perhaps anoles will eat what ever bug it happens to encounter and skull diversity is the result of other selection pressures. At this time we do not yet know. Interestingly, however, preliminary evidence suggests that the primary food source of many anoles are just ants, which while quite abundant are not very nutritious. Ants can account for up to 80% of the stomach contents of A. distichus for example.
The embedded video gave me an idea for a great experiment that can be done in a controlled setting. Simply run various bugs across the screen of an iPad and see if different species preferentially target particular sizes or shapes. If anyone would like to donate an iPad to this cause of utmost importance I would be happy to perform the experiments.
- Short Faces, Two Faces, No Faces: Lizards Heads Are Susceptible to Embryonic Thermal Stress - December 15, 2021
- The Super Sticky Super Power of Lizards: a New Outreach Activity for Grade-Schoolers - April 9, 2018
- Updates on the Development of Anolis as a “Model Clade” of Integrative Analyses of Anatomical Evolution - September 4, 2017
gabriel gartner
Thom,
This is a great post, and incredibly relevant. I would be willing to participate in such an experiment. Let me think about it for a bit, and then I’ll comment some more.
Thomas Sanger
Come to think of it we need two iPads so that we have both technical and biological replicates. You are in!
Ambika Kamath
This might also be a cool way of dissociating visual prey cues from olfactory or gustatory cues. Which likely isn’t relevant to anoles, but could be useful in some cordylids or geckos.
Ambika Kamath
Ooh, one could also assess responses to different types of prey e.g. flying vs. terrestrial prey. There is some evidence (e.g. from Lister and Aguayo, 1992) that anoles perched at higher are more likely to eat flying prey, and it would be neat to test if this is actually a preference or (more likely) pure opportunism.
Bill Bateman
I’ve just watched a sagrei that was stuck in my office (it’s been rescued and released outside now) biting the glass to get at a couple of leaf hoppers crawling on the other side of the window. Poor bugger was getting frantic. You could manipulate level of hunger and see how that influences choice. As I am unlikely to ever have an ipad, good luck and I look forward to seeing the published paper!
Janson
A follow up from another YouTube user who tried the same iDevice game, only with a frog. The last few seconds demand RESPECT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=WlEzvdlYRes .
Jonathan Losos
I think someone needs to try this experiment with a knight anole.
Janson
lol. Maybe with a desktop computer and a military-grade body shield there might be a chance of survival.