Remarkably little is known about the natural history of the Puerto Rican twig anole, Anolis occultus, except where it sleeps. The reason is simple: the
animal is small, moves slowly, is highly cryptic and probably spends a lot of its time amidst the twigs high in the canopy. As a result, there have been reports of only a handful of animals located while they are active.
In a just published paper, Ríos-López and colleagues report two new observations of these charming little lizards, one of nectarivory (above) and the other, sadly, of predation by a kingbird (right). In addition, the paper presents a comprehensive review of what we know about this species and its conservation prospects.
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.
Latest posts by Jonathan Losos (see all)
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Skip Lazell
Nectivores are nectivorous and practice nectivory — or at least have all my long life! Skip
Jonathan Losos
The dictionary says you’ve been wrong all your life!
Skip Lazell
I’ll go with K. Ra, 2013, AA December 2013.