Kings of Greater Antillean Anole Taxonomy V: Orlando Garrido

The last of the five kings described more new anoles than any of the others: Orlando Garrido. Garrido is unique among the five in two ways. First, he’s still alive, still active, and still making contributions to our understanding of anole diversity. Second, he’s actually a citizen of a Greater Antillean country: Cuba.

Garrido is often recognized as Cuba’s greatest naturalist. In addition to his impressive body of work with reptiles, he has made many other important contributions to our understanding of Cuban nature, including the spectacular “Field Guide to the Birds of Cuba.” His successes are a testament to how far science has come since Barbour’s time, when practicing science in the West Indies required a wealthy North American pedigree. I’ve credited Garrido with a whopping 24 species, all from his native Cuba.

Many of the species Garrido described are locally endemic variants of widespread forms. For example, Garrido described numerous species that were phenotypically similar to the widespread trunk ground anole, A. sagrei (e.g., confusus, guafe, delafuentei). Garrido was the first to appreciate that many of these local variants often met all the criteria expected of good species. First, they were typically diagnosed by striking differences in dewlap color and pattern combined with subtle, but distinct, differences in scalation and other morphological traits. Second, they often appeared to be specialized for life in somewhat unusual local habitats. Finally, and perhaps most convincingly, they often existed sympatrically with related and phenotypically similar species.

Unfortunately, many of the species described by Garrido remain very poorly known. Some are known only from the type series. Others have yet to be subjected to additional systematic treatment. There’s no telling what we’ll find when serious phylogenetic and population genetic analyses are conducted on the fascinating species he described.