Photographs by Odey Martínez Llanes
Photograph by Odey Martínez Llanes
Category: All Posts Page 4 of 148
Photo by Julie Katz
Hard to imagine a more important service than this! Miami resident Julie Katz provides the details: “When I walked out of my condo building one night this past spring to walk my dog I encountered a first – a small lizard feasting on a roach.”
Go anoles!
Anolis porcatus (left) found at a plant nursery in Aruba (right).
It was late December 2018. My partner in work and life, Matt, and I were headed back to Curaçao to conduct some follow-up sampling. We had recently completed a field season in Curaçao where we had discovered three newly introduced gecko species (Behm et al. 2019). Since we had to fly through Aruba to get to Curaçao, we decided when booking our trip to spend some time in Aruba, too, to look around for introduced herps, since that’s one of our favorite ways to spend our time when traveling (we’ve even been known to trick family members into searching for introduced herps while on vacation – e.g., Behm et al. 2018). Aruba and Curaçao are neighbors and since Aruba is even more economically connected than Curaçao, we suspected there may have been undiscovered non-native herps there.
What we did not expect was that in less than 3 days on Aruba, we would find three new non-native species (Anolis gingivinus, A. cristatellus and Hemidactylus frenatus) and document a range expansion for a 4th non-native anole (A. porcatus) already known to be on Aruba (Behm et al. 2022). Even though we focused our surveys on properties like plant nurseries and resorts that had a strong likelihood of harboring introduced species due to their influx of ornamental plant shipments, this was still a very high number of species in a short amount of time.
I wanted to understand how these newly documented species fit within the context of the other non-native herps on Aruba. Specifically, I wanted to understand the circumstances surrounding the initial introductions and the current habitat use of the species on Aruba to assess whether any emergent patterns could be gleaned for Aruba. If so, these patterns may lend further insight into how and why the Caribbean has emerged as a hotspot for species invasions (e.g., Helmus et al. 2014, Perella and Behm 2020, Gleditsch et al. 2023).
What seemed like a simple task ended up being more challenging than expected due to the scant and sometimes contradictory information in the literature surrounding the species introductions. To make sense of it all, I enlisted the help of a brilliant undergraduate in my lab, Gianna Busala, whose tenacity and attention-to-detail made it possible to reconstruct some of the invasion history on Aruba. Our recent publication (Busala et al. 2024) compiles all of what we found about the introduced herps on Aruba.
In conducting our research, there were several issues we encountered.
Photo by Christa Denning (aka, @DenningDesign)
From Twitter
Water anole from the Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica (Photo by Lindsey Swierk)
Written by Andrés Rojo:
The water anole (Anolis aquaticus) is a Costa Rican anole that changes color and pattern in different microhabitats as a form of camouflage to avoid detection by their predators, which include birds like motmots and kingfishers. Because of its body color complexity and rapid color changes, water anoles are great study organisms to use when examining how animal camouflage, social signaling, and visual perception interact.
My research project was inspired by Dr. Lindsey Swierk and her lab’s work on water anole color change and camouflage. I joined the Swierk lab as an undergraduate in February of 2021, as I was interested in tropical ecology and animal behavior. I am also a photo hobbyist and experiment with color and full spectrum photography. Dr. Swierk thought that I would be a good fit with the research team studying water anole colors and patterns. When she told me about it, I was motivated by my enthusiasm for photography and wildlife research to take on the project, especially the idea that I could modify research-grade photos to model how animals see one another.
An example color cloud map showing the colors of a water anole (gray) and its substrate (red) as seen through an avian visual system. The X axis represents a green-to-red progression of colors, and the Y axis represents yellow-to-blue colors. Water anoles do not have UV body colors in the regions measured (dorsal and lateral surfaces). Darker tones indicate more pixels of colors at that location within chromaticity space.
Dr. Swierk and I decided to test whether the body coloration of A. aquaticus would be perceived differently by the visual systems of water anoles’ predators and their conspecifics. We used ImageJ and the micaToolbox (QCPA) to model the two visual systems and apply them to each photo taken in the field. The anole and substrate photos were converted into color maps, which could be compared to determine how much the color of the anole overlapped with the color of the substrate in the visual systems of predators and conspecifics – a measure of conspicuousness of anoles according to both visual systems.
A comparison of body color – background color overlap of water anoles as seen through bird and anole visual models, including males (blue) and females (gold).
Although we found no significant difference in how camouflaged A. aquaticus were perceived by the visual systems of predators and conspecifics, our results suggested that males more consistently color matched their microhabitats compared to females and that females were less likely to color match their backgrounds in their lighter phase, suggesting a sex difference in preferred conspicuity in more exposed habitats. These could present topics for future research into how anoles use color camouflage to avoid being detected by predators.
The ubiquity of Brown Anoles (Anolis sagrei) in Florida means that they are constantly on my mind. Given the proposition that rapid evolution may be important to invasive species success, I was curious to determine if invasive Brown Anoles in the southeastern United States, centered in Florida, have any morphological differences from Brown Anoles in their native range in Cuba. To address this question, I measured museum specimens to compare Brown Anole morphology between their invasive and native range and “go back in time” to see if Brown Anole morphology has changed since their invasion.
As reported in our recent paper, Brown Anoles have broadly similar morphology between their native Cuban and invasive Florida ranges. Additionally, we found no clear evidence of the measured morphological traits changing over time. These results suggest that rapid morphological evolution may not be essential to the success of invasive Brown Anoles.
Abstract:
Understanding why some species and not others are successful global invaders is an important question in ecology and evolutionary biology. There is much debate on the role that rapid post-invasion adaptation plays in the success of invasive species. Here, we investigated signals of rapid and broad-scale morphological evolution in Anolis sagrei (Brown Anole) between their invasive and native distributions. Although we found significant differences in a few morphological characters between invasive and native Brown Anoles, the morphological variation present in the species broadly overlapped between both populations and has not significantly changed over the last century. These results suggest the invasive success of Brown Anoles in Florida may not be due to major evolutionary change from their Cuban ancestors.
Researchers have thought of putting anoles in experimental wind tunnels. Perhaps this is the next best evidence? Or maybe this was a setup? Either way, we can see the classic anole response to falling.
h/t Mike Whitlock
from the pages of Forbes:
An Anole (Anolis) lizard from Colombia, with an orange dewlap. Photo: CAMILO ANDRÉS ESTUPIÑAN
How Do You Tell Colombia’s Bright, Zany Anole Lizards Apart?
A group of passionate lizard scientists have published a guide to the dozens of species of Anolis: small, brightly-coloured tree lizards related to iguanas. Colombia holds more than 75 species of Anolis which are and males have large throat fans called dewlaps, to attract females.
Camilo Andrés Estupiñan, a biologist at Icesi University in Colombia and a researcher at the Interandinos Foundation, is currently leading a project to create an illustrated guide of Anolis in Colombia. “Colombia has the greatest diversity of Anolis species in the world, and this book seeks to capture and share that richness,” he says, adding that this is a collaborative effort that came out of the Interandinos Foundation.
“The information available on these species is quite scattered, which represents a great challenge for us, but we have received incredible support from the scientific community, who have contributed significantly,” he says, “Maria, the illustrator of this book, has done an exceptional job, exceeding our expectations with illustrations that accurately capture the unique characteristics of each species.”
Estupiñan explains that this project is crucial not only for biodiversity conservation, but also for fostering knowledge and appreciation of our rich biodiversity, empowering local communities.
“We hope that this book will not be the last of its kind, but will open the doors for future scientific dissemination projects on reptiles in Colombia, contributing to a deeper knowledge and greater conservation of these species,” he says.
Estupiñan explains that in Colombia, local communities such as farmers and indigenous people are “true guardians of the forests” and have direct and constant contact with natural resources.
“They see biodiversity not only as a resource to be conserved, but as part of their identity and can provide valuable data that enriches science,” he says, “In this context, projects such as the Anolis illustrated guide are fundamental, as they not only promote the knowledge and conservation of biodiversity, but also empower these communities.”
Excerpt from the guide to Colombian anoles. FUNDACIÓN INTERANDINOS
Passion For Colombia’s Lizards
Estupiñan was born and raised in Cali, Colombia and says as a child he has always had a deep passion for reptiles. “This passion led me to study biology at Icesi University, where I was fortunate to meet Jhan Carlos Salazar, who was finishing his thesis on the physiology of Anolis lizards,” he says, “He took me to do field work and introduced me to these fascinating lizards, which further ignited my passion for them.”
Estupiñan would go to to start a master’s degree in engineering and teaching undergraduate conservation biology.
“With a clear vision of contributing significantly to research, environmental education and scientific dissemination in Colombia, I founded together with some colleagues and friends the Interandinos Foundation,” he says, “Since its creation, the foundation has allowed me to channel my passion for nature and science into concrete actions that have a real impact on our community and beyond.”
Estupiñan explains that scientists from the Global South bring a deep understanding of their own ecological, social and economic contexts, which is essential for developing sustainable and effective solutions to problems that affect both locally and globally.
“This proximity not only allows for greater precision in identifying problems, but also facilitates the implementation of solutions that are culturally and environmentally appropriate,” he says, “Ultimately, integrating these voices and perspectives into global science is not only right, but also essential to effectively address the environmental, social and developmental challenges we face today.”
Camilo Estupiñan and an anole lizard. Photo: Jhan Carlos Salazar
More Passion for Anoles
Biologist Jhan Salazar, who is also a collaborator on the illustrated guide, graduated from the Biology Program in 2018 from Icesi University, in Cali, in the south of Colombia and is now pursuing his PhD in Evolution, Ecology and Population Biology at the Washington University in St. Louis.
“My research is focused on Anolis lizards now, but I want to study other lizard genres, snakes, and frogs in the future,” he says, adding that his passion for studying reptiles started back when he was growing up in the country-side of Cauca, Colombia.
“We grew up surrounded by nature and when I was 11, I went out with my family we went on a trip and that really influenced me,” he says, “Its a rural zone and a forested zone.”
In 2019, he was also announced as the winner of the Young Afro-Colombian 2019.