Olivier Testa, a french speleologist in Port-au-Prince, just returned from a five week speleological expedition in the area, where the team recorded more than 80 shafts and encountered this anole at the bottom of one. There’s a video, too. Anyone know what it is?
Professor of Biology and Director of the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University in Saint Louis. I've spent my entire professional career studying anoles and have discovered that the more I learn about anoles, the more I realize I don't know.
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cristian marte
Hello,
Could you please mention the approximate size of the animal and the place where it was collected? It may be a species of the Giant Anolis of the island.
Regards
Jonathan Losos
It’s about 20 centimeters long, including the tail
K.ra
It looks like a female Anolis ricordi, the color matches but I’m not sure about the dewlap. According to a quick Google search animals from the northern slope of the Massif de la Selle (which is near Port -au- Prince and where I suspect this animal was collected from) have not been assigned to a subspecies.
K.ra
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/11949140@N07/4053503009“>Female Anolis baleatus from Flickr.
K.ra
oops! bad link setup.And change baleatus to ricordi.
Rich Glor
I agree that this is a juvenile A. ricordii (note that the correct spelling of this name is ricordii not ricordi). I cannot tell the sexes of this species apart from a distance. What makes you think this is a female?
K.ra
The size mainly (20cm t0tal is about 100mm SVL right?), and also because the Flickr photostream that the picture I linked to above came from also contains this picture (both photos appear to have been taken at night in the animals sleeping coloration). The dewlap however makes me think that this is indeed a juvenile.
The photo at the beginning of the post you linked above shows an animal with similar coloration.Are there also bright green males/can individuals with that beige color turn bright green in the population that this individual originates from?
I have never seen A.ricordii in real life so I’m asking out of curiosity.
Olivier Testa
We found the animal trapped in a pothole (25m deep) in the Formon plateau, on the southern part of Macaya Biosphere Reserve (Massif La Hotte), at an altitude of 1100m.
The specimen is still trapped in the pothole.
K.ra
In that case it is probably Anolis ricordi leberi.
cristian marte
I agree with K.ra it seems to be an Anolis ricordi but apparently it is a juvenile or female of the species according to the size you mentioned. Could you put the location where it was collected, that would give a view to compare it with the species’ distribution.
Olivier Testa
Thanks for your answers.
The specimen was found like shown on the map, near Formon
Maybe I’ll check in a few years to see wether it was a juvenile 😉