That’s one beat up looking old dude, but apparently he’s still got it. Or does he? She seems to have one foot out the door.
We’ve been following the backyard anole antics reported in Daffodil’s Photo Blog for some time now, and Easter provided a heartwarming photo-story of an old guy who can still find some love. And this old guy seems like he’s seen some better days.
The Hispaniolan Northern Green Anole (Anolis cholorocyanus) is a widespread species in the trunk-crown ecomorph. Its known distribution is almost entirely restricted, as the name indicates, to the north paleo-island of Hispaniola, but also includes Gonave, Tortue and Saona islands, and some portions of local “mesic” (oases) forests and hills south of Valle de Neiba, in the northern slopes of Sierra de Baoruco.
A. chlorocyanus, photographed at Jaragua National Park station in Laguna de Oviedo, Pedernales province.
The individual pictured to the left was photographed the 12th of March 2013 in a far south locality for the species, in the facilities of the Jaragua National Park, NE of Oviedo. Consulting Schwartz & Henderson 1991, and Henderson & Powell 2009, it is mentioned that its occurrence may extend into the Barahona city, which is 53 kms from the recently reported locality (Google Earth, measured as airline distance). Caribherp.com does not display it for that area in the species’ range map. Anolis chlorocyanus is a mesophilic anole as well as a human commensal, so there is the possibility that the species arrived at this disjunct locality by the transportation of construction material used to build the park’s station (several years ago), or arrived on flotsam that often washes ashore in this area of the Barahona peninsula coast (sea currents bring debris and garbage from far east). Since A. chlorocyanus‘s south island counterpart, A. coelestinus, has a restricted range through the Domincan Republic, I haven’t seen any interaction between the two, despite the fact that the latter is also a human commensal (in Pedernales and along the Barahona coast). A similar scenario could be displayed when comparing distributions of other two ecologically (tough xeric) equivalent north and south island species: A. whitemani and A. longitibialis; the former shares a similar distribution with A. chlorocyanus along the Baorucos, and seems to be limited by topographic/climate features or direct competition by its southern counterpart, A. longitibialis. I have observed both species of trunk-ground anoles independently using the same saxicolous-based subtrate in this mountain range, one in the southern (but primarily in the Barahona peninsula’s lowlands), the other in its northern slopes.
Adding some more ecological notes, A. chlorocyanus can often be observed using royal palm trees (Roystonea), usually high near the base of flower/fruit fronds, which when in blossom attract many bees and other insects. 
A. chlorocyanus as typically seen in Los Haitises, in a royal palm (Roystonea). Photo taken near Caño Hondo.
Anolis heterodermus. Photo by J. Losos.
Although many generic names have been proposed for species within the anole clade, traditionally only three other than Anolis were widely used: Chamaeleolis, Chamaelinorops and Phenacosaurus. Each of these clades—which at one time were thought to represent early, pre-Anolis derivations from the anoline line—are morphologically distinctive. The former two, Chamaeleolis and Chamaelinorops, need no introduction—they are oddball species that at first pass might not even be recognized as anoles, and that have received a modicum of scientific study. The third clade, Phenacosaurus, by contrast, has been mostly ignored. This is surprising, because at least some species are quite notable morphologically, with head casques, heterogeneous scalation, wild colors, and an all-over prehistoric appearance. Moreover, they live at remarkably high altitudes, at least by anole standards, and have a passing resemblance—some species more than others—to Caribbean twig anoles. Nonetheless, there is almost no literature on the natural history or evolution of these anoles.
Ken Miyata’s 1983 Journal of Herpetology paper is the one exception. In it, he describes the habitat use of A. heterodermus in areas near Bogotá, Colombia. His description paints the species as one that uses narrow perches on bushes and other vegetation, and that is especially plentiful in blackberry bushes. Combined with its short legs, heterogeneous body and head scalation and elongate and compressed body, reminiscent of twig anoles like A. valencienni, one might entertain the possibility that it is in functional terms a mainland twig anole.
A year and a half ago, we reported in AA on our studies of another phenacosaur, the much smaller A. orcesi from Ecuador. Our studies conclusively demonstrated that it is in all respects like a twig anole—behaviorally, it moves extremely slow; ecologically, it is found almost entirely on narrow surfaces; and morphologically, it is a Caribbean twig anole doppelgänger. But in one respect, A. orcesi was a disappointment—it looks just like any old anole, without the wildly prehistoric aspect for which the larger phenacosaurs are renowned. For this reason, it was time to examine another phenac, and what better choice could there be than A. heterodermus, the subject of Miyata’s study, supposedly common near Bogotá, and appropriately wild in appearance?
And so Rosario Castañeda, Anthony Herrel and I converged on Bogotá in late February for just this purpose, joined by Rafael Moreno, a graduate student at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, who has just completed his masters degree research on this species, with one fine paper out and more in the works. Our plan was simple: go to appropriate spots on the outskirts of Bogotá, locate lizards in the vegetation, watch them and record habitat use and behavior, then capture them and bring them back to the field lab to measure sprinting and biting capabilities and to examine their stomach contents.
Fringe-lipped bat chows on a frog. Apparently, they take lizards, too. Photo from Smithsonian Science.
A quick answer to my question posed a few days ago. Some bats do, indeed, eat anoles. In particular, the fringe-lipped bat Trachops cirrhosus has been reported to do so a number of times, I now know thanks to avid anolologist and zoological polymath Anthony Herrel. Try googling “anole” and “trachops.” One hit with several references comes from the entry in Mammalian Species for Trachops, although only one paper specifically identifies anoles (A. lemurinus being the victim), as opposed to “lizards” or geckos.
Anolis fuscoauratus. Photo by Roberto Langstroth
AA reader Roberto Langstroth writes:
Perhaps Anole Annals readers would enjoy these shots of a displaying A. fuscoauratus on the Nassau Plateau of Suriname. The second photo shows some interesting behavior, e.g., the tail curling and the tongue protrusion. There were two individuals involved in vigorous displays…as the third blurry “artistic shot” shows… They were on a vertical trunk of a large tree about 6 meters above ground on a steep slope on the plateau in March 2010.
From Daffodil’s Photo Blog
We’ve had a series of posts on rates of tail regeneration. Daffodil’s Photo Blog, which often features anoles, has just presented a photo tryptych illustrating tail regrowth in green anoles.
Caicos Dwarf Boa (Tropidophis greenway) eating an Anolis scriptus. Photo by Matthew Niemiller.
Neotropical snake and Caribbean expert Bob Henderson writes: “In going over some prey data for a chapter on diet and foraging in species of Corallus and the dramatic dichotomy between West Indian and mainland Corallus, I came up with some numbers you might find interesting.
I recovered 970 vertebrate prey items from West Indian snakes. Of those, 559 (57.6%) were anoles. The next closest prey genus was Eleutherodactylus (129; 13.3%).
Among ground dwelling or largely ground-dwelling species (tropes, colubrids, dipsadids), anoles accounted for 54.1% of their prey. Among arboreal snakes (Corallus, Hispaniolan Epicrates, and Uromacer), anoles accounted for 64.1%.
I suspect there are very few West Indian macrostomatan snakes that do not include anoles in their diets at some time during their lives.”
Don McLeish has photo-documented an amazing battle between two green anoles in his backyard. The fight went on for at least an hour, and when he checked in on the lizards at night, one was still breathing hard hours later. Check out the photos!
Currently in Guadeloupe to investigate in collaboration with the National Park the distribution of sub-species of anoles with a colleague of the University of Toulouse (France), we saw an extraordinary scene of predation of a female anole (Anolis marmoratus speciosus) by Scolopendra gigantea. In Guadeloupe, the predation pressure is essentially due by cats, dogs, blackbirds and thrushes. At our knowledge, the scolopendre have never been reported before …
Anolis sagrei nelsoni from Little Swan Island. Photo by Alexis Harrison
Where the Swans meet.
My first two posts [1,2] reported on how we got to the Swan Islands and what we found on Great Swan, especially the anoles. But after five days on the island, we had given up hope of crossing the strait to Little Swan Island. The navy on the island had no boat. The channel between the islands, while narrow, was deep and carried a substantial current. From the air, it appeared that there were no sandy beaches on which to land, only jagged rocks beyond the jagged reef.
That afternoon, we were surprised to hear the sound of a motor. From the top of the dilapidated radio tower, someone spotted a small boat headed for the island. It turned out to be a lobster boat, headed back to the mainland of Honduras after several weeks collecting lobsters offshore. They were stopping at Swan Island to replenish their supply of plantains and rainwater. With a little haggling, we were able to persuade the captain to ferry us over to Little Swan the next day and pick us up again several hours later!
Heading to the lobster boat
We arranged to leave the next morning at 6 a.m. The morning came and we packed our gear and went to wait at the dock. Two men headed from the boat to the shore in rickety-looking fiberglass canoes and we piled in: three in one canoe and two in the other. Randy and I were sitting in the canoe with three and I was a little nervous. The lip of the canoe seemed awfully close to the water line and the surf was high enough to bounce us around. But the sailor paddling us back seemed unconcerned, so away we went.
We made it about halfway to the boat before a wave came up to the lip of the canoe and poured in. Within moments the canoe had disappeared beneath us and we were bobbing in the water a couple hundred feet from shore. My first thought was that my camera was going to get wet – the second thought was that it is hard to tread water in hiking boots. I tried to hold my backpack over the water while we waited for the second canoe to come over. I was able to toss my bag into the canoe, then we held on to the side of the canoe and were towed back to the shore. The other canoe and Randy’s rake stayed on the bottom of the ocean.
Our next attempt to reach the boat was successful. This time, we used three canoes. The captain of the boat was also able to find three life jackets to send along, just in case.
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