Author: HannahKimFrank

Aquatic Anole Sleep Site Fidelity

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Juvenile Anolis aquaticus wakes up for science, Photo: Jonathan Flanders

One of the many wonderful things about anoles is that anole-hunting can be a 24/7 experience, as many nocturnal Anole Annals adventurers have shown and I’ve noted before. As an undergraduate, I spent many days and nights scanning trunks, leaves, sticks, bushes, etc. for anoles — a habit that got so ingrained that I still do it while hiking around northern California. So, logically, when I found myself in Costa Rica for the last field season of my Ph.D. (which is on bats), I had to do some lizard spotting, if only to remind myself of the good old days when I studied animals that don’t fly or bite. (Ok, anoles bite but that’s what makes them such great fashion accessories.) As I was already up until all hours of the night, I decided to check out where anoles were sleeping. There happened to be a small group of aquatic anoles living near my cabin and I (along with my batty colleague) noticed that each night they seemed to be in the same place — one email to Jonathan later and we wrote up a short note for Herpetological Review about sleep site fidelity in Anolis aquaticus.

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Who turned the sun on? Photo: Jonathan Flanders

We observed the lizards for 16 nights over a period of 24 nights and found that of the six individuals, they were in the same place almost 80% of the nights, which is very high compared to what has been found in some other species. All of the lizards were perched in such a way that they were either obscured from view or had easy access to water to escape from predators. The area was particularly dry at that time so this may have reduced the number of suitable sleep sites for these aquatic lizards or maybe aquatic anoles are just pretty faithful to their sleep sites. In any case, it was a lot of fun to go back to my lizard-y roots and find some sleepy anoles.

 

 

Some Sleepy Anoles from Costa Rica

I’m in southern Costa Rica doing field work with bats, but once an anole lover, always an anole lover so when I get a night off I like to go herping. Since everyone loves a sleeping anole (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, among others), I thought I’d share some photos that a friend and I took while wandering around at night. I’m not sure what the last one is; I’m guessing Anolis polylepis (we’re at 1100m at the Las Cruces Biological Station and it was sleeping about 1m above the ground).

Anolis capito. Photo by Jon Flanders

Anolis capito. Photo by Jon Flanders

Anolis aquaticus. Photo by Jon Flanders

Anolis aquaticus. Photo by Jon Flanders

Anolis polylepis? Photo by Jon Flanders

Anolis polylepis? Photo by Jon Flanders

Anole ID help

Hello anole enthusiasts!

A friend of mine was in Las Tablas, Puntarenas, Costa Rica, ~1850m and found these guys. They were sleeping on some overhanging roots where the ground had broken off near a cattle pasture. We were wondering about which species they belong to and thought the brilliant people here could help. Thanks!

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