Photo by Jill Davidson-Guillen.

Jill Davidson-Guillen of Boca Raton, Florida, had an unexpected guest when she went swimming in her backyard pool last week. She said that she routinely finds curly-tailed lizards in the pool, but this was the first knight anole.

Ms. Ann-Ole thanks local herpetologists. From the Wild Amelia Facebook Page: Many thanks to herpetologists Mark Beshel (far left) and Caleb Bress (far right) of the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens for their entertaining and informative presentation on the green anole at the last of the Wild Nites this Festival year. Who knew the green anole could be sooo much fun? Thanks also to our own Ms-Ann-ole! Photo–Scott Moore

The just completed Wild Amelia Nature Festival this year featured the green anole as its mascot. AA‘s friend, anole author Karen Cusick, attended and filed this report:

“The Wild Amelia Facebook page has photos and some info on a lot of the activities–releasing sea turtles, ecotours on foot, by kayak, and by segway, learning about bats with the Bat Lady, sunrise yoga on the beach, etc., so I hope that helped.

Although the green anole was the Critter of the Year, the main things specifically related to green anoles were: the green anole presentation by the people from the zoo (along with the person in the anole suit); a couple of booths at the expo that featured some pictures and books about anoles and other lizards; the kids’ activity where they got prizes for going around answering questions about anoles; and the festival tee shirts with the anole logo. I noticed that the person in the anole costume was also on hand to congratulate two children for becoming Seashore Junior Naturalists.”

Karen also nabbed two photography awards for the photos below. Congratulations, Karen!

Award-winning photo by Karen Cusick. First place in “Other Fauna” category for non-professional photographers.

Another award-winning photo by Karen Cusick. First place in “Bird” category

Here’s yet another three-legged lizard. This is a male brown anole (Anolis sagrei) from Abaco, Bahamas  Despite missing most of its right leg (yes, the image is reversed), the little guy was fat and sassy and got around just fine. When he was let go, he even crouched down as if about to jump, before thinking better of it.

We’ve had plenty of previous postings on these three-leggers [for the full list, type “three-legged lizard” into the search bar on the right]. Always looking for more examples!

This just in from Twitter.

Introducing Anolis elcopeensis. (B) is a female; the rest are males.

In their new paper in Amphibian & Reptile Conservation, Poe and colleagues note that thirteen new species of Anolis have been described from Panama since 2007, bringing that country’s total to 44. They now raise those numbers to 15 and 45.

The first thing you need to know about Anolis elcopeensis is how to pronounce it. It’s named after the park formerly known as El Cope National Park in Panama, so it’s el-coh-pay-en-sis (the park now goes by the name Parque Nacional G. D. Omar Torrijos H.).

The second thing you need to know is that A. elcopeensis is a very close relative of A. fuscoauratus, a species widely-distributed throughout Amazonia and elsewhere in South America. Anolis elcopeensis differs from A. fuscoauratus and related species by its orange dewlap and small size (maximum: 45 mm snout-vent length). Mitochondrial DNA differences support its designation as a distinct species.

With the recognition of A. elcopeensis, that brings us to 399 Anolis species (according to a search on the Reptile Database)! Woo-hoo! And I suspect there are more soon to come. Indeed, Poe et al. suggest that A. fuscoauratus may be a complex of many cryptic species. Stay tuned!

Abstract:

We describe Anolis elcopeensis, a new species of anole lizard from low to moderate elevations of the Pacific slope of the Cordillera Central of central Panama. Anolis elcopeensis is a close relative of and resembles the Amazonian species A. fuscoauratus but differs from it and similar species mainly in body size, male dewlap color, and mitochondrial DNA. We estimate the phylogenetic position of the new species relative to all species of Anolis, and analyze variation in the mitochondrial COI gene among some populations of the new species. We also discuss the mythical presence of Anolis fuscoauratus in Panama, document the possible occurrence of A. maculiventris in Panama, and present preliminary evidence for multiple cryptic fuscoauratus-like species in eastern Panama.

The cover highlights the paper “Restriction Site-Associated DNA Sequencing (RAD-seq) Reveals an Extraordinary Number of Transitions among Gecko Sex-Determining Systems” by Tony Gamble and colleagues.

Michele Johnson’s Lab at Trinity University seems to have brains on the brain. Jake Stercula recently reported on his studies on how the different preferred temperatures of Puerto Rican anoles species affects their brains. That is, how do brains of different species handle being at different temperatures? Read all about his research on “how temperature affects lizard brain cells.”

Meanwhile, Johnson lab member Maria Jaramillo is studying how lizard brains process different images. She’s showing anoles videos of another lizard displaying or of a leaf and investigating how brain activity differs.

Photo by Kristin Winchell

Cannibalism and a three-and-a-half legged lizard–field trips don’t start any better than that! Read all about it on Kristin Winchell’s website, Adaptability.

Photo by Ambika Kamath

Behavioral research is often reduced to a large set of data points, necessary of course for statistical analysis. But sometimes what gets lost is actual knowledge of what animals do in their natural habitats. There’s no substitute for just watching an animal over the course of a day or  a week. Often what you’ll see is that animals are not little automatons, repetitively undertaking particular actions in accord (or not) with our theories. Rather, they have lives where they do all kinds of idiosyncratic behaviors, the sort of quirky detail that often get lost in high-falutin’ analyses of behavior. Ambika Kamath demonstrated just this in her recent post, “A Week in the Life of U131.” Here’s the first paragraph. You’ll have to go to her website to read the rest:

When you’re collecting data on the behaviour of individual animals over time, as I am this summer, your observations sometimes feel less like a collection of numbers and more like a collection of personal narratives. Of course, the data are both numbers and narratives, and when it comes time to analyze this collection of datapoints and understand the patterns that emerge from it, the numbers will be all that matter. But in the meanwhile, before I can look the bigger picture, I enjoy considering the individual narratives. And this week, I encountered a lizard whose story illustrates why it’s worth considering these narratives at all.

The goal of Anole Annals is to be the clearinghouse for all things Anolis, the place that the anole community turns to for the exchange of information or ideas. To do so, we welcome–no, heartily encourage–contributions from anyone and everyone.

Who can post? Anyone who has something to say about the biology, natural history, or amazing-ness of anoles (well, within reason–we leave anole husbandry and sales issues to other websites). And fear not–you’ll have an audience. Anole Annals is now routinely visited by 600-1000 readers a day. That sounds like a broader impact to me!

Anole Annals is a good place to let the anole community know what you’re working on, like Ambika Kamath’s recent overview of her fascinating work on anole social behavior. And, it’s a great way to spread word of your recently published work–why not provide a short precis or tell the backstory of how the paper came to be, like Liam Revell recently did? It’s a great way of giving people the short story of what you’ve done and get them interested in reading the whole paper.

If you are fortunate to live in an anole-inhabited region, tell us about your local species, like David Alfonso’s recent post on the anoles of Colombia. And if you’ve observed something unusual, here’s a good place to report it, like Graham Reynolds note on twig anoles using mangroves.

And it’s just a great place to ask a question, post a photo, or report an observation. Plus, announcements of relevant conferences or personal milestones, such as newly-minted Ph.D.s, are always appropriate.

Posting is easy, and really doesn’t take much time. More than 100 scientists and anole enthusiasts have written posts–you should too! And if you’ve done so before, you’re overdue for another one. Don’t overthink it–just post today!