Anole Annals

Where do you work and what do you do?  

 I’m a retired Associate Professor at Florida Southern College in Lakeland, FL. While at FSC from 2007 through 2016, I conducted research and taught courses in animal behavior, zoology, evolution, and ecology, as well as a capstone course in undergraduate research. I also took students to Jamaica and Bermuda to conduct field research on anoles.

What aspects of anole biology do you study, and what have you learned? 

 I’ve worked mainly on the production and perception of color and motion displays. Most of this research has been conducted collaboratively with my colleague Dave Clark and has been experimental in nature, e.g., video playbacks and anole robots. Leo Fleishman’s work on Anolis sensory ecology has been a major influence on my thinking about how lizards perceive their color displays. I’ve learned that working on anole behavior can be challenging and that, in fact, most experiments fail! But I’ve also learned that it is well worth the effort in the end.

How and why did you start studying anoles? 

 When I was a kid growing up in the 1950’s and 1960’s in central Pennsylvania, individual Anolis carolinensis used to be sold at the circus in little “animal cracker” boxes. I still remember bringing one home. My father built a small cage for it and tirelessly caught insects for it. Much later, as a postdoc at U.C. Davis in 1992, I was reintroduced to magic of anoles by none other than Jonathan Losos. At that time, Jonathan was a postdoc with Tom Schoener and heard about the video playback work that we were doing in Peter Marler’s Lab. Jonathan was interested in figuring out two things: First, would anoles respond to video recordings of other anoles displaying? And second, if they did respond to video, could anoles discriminate conspecific from heterospecific displays? With our Marler Lab colleague Chris Evans, we showed that A. marcanoi males spent more time displaying in synchrony with video clips of conspecific male displays than heterospecific male (A. cybotes) displays. Soon after that, Judy Stamps and I conducted an even more successful video playback experiment on species recognition, in which we used Anolis grahami from Jamaica as subjects.

What do you love most about studying anoles? 

 What’s not to love? I recall Chris Evans calling them “magnificent beasts”, as well as Duncan Irschick referring to them as “mini gods”. Anoles are endlessly fascinating, and you could never run out of species to research.

What is your favorite anole species? 

 Regarding species that I’ve worked with personally, Anolis grahami is probably my favorite. They are reliable performers in behavioral experiments and are always up to the challenge of responding to another anole (or a video of one, or an anole robot!). There are two runners up, however. Anolis conspersus with its blue dewlap (actually a UV-reflecting dewlap whose wavelengths extend into the blue range) is quite photogenic, as a number of contributors to Anole Annals have noted. The other runner up would be Anolis extremus. Their complex color pattern is exceptional, and although they are frustratingly squirrelly to approach in the field, male tail lifting contests can be spectacular. Anolis extremus really are extreme!

Where can people learn more about you and follow you online? 

Website: www.macedonialab.com

Where do you work and what do you do?  

I am an Assistant Research Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Binghamton University, State University of New York. I am also the Associate Director of Research of the Amazon Conservatory for Tropical Studies, outside Iquitos, Peru. My research group studies ecology at the organismal level, with a focus on behavior and herpetology. I primarily conduct fieldwork in Costa Rica and Peru. At the university, I teach courses in animal behavior and ecology, and I am involved with initiatives to promote underrepresented students in biology. I was a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University and received my PhD in Ecology from Penn State in 2013.

What aspects of anole biology do you study, and what have you learned? 

 My background in behavioral ecology first nudged my interest in anoles towards communication and reproductive behavior. I have a particular interest in understanding how sexual signals function and evolve. My group studies anole dewlaps and their costs and benefits. The use of color and patterns, both on the dewlap and the entire body, is also a focus in my group. We use both observational and experimental techniques to better understand how anoles use sexual coloration and behavioral displays to maximize fitness. We’ve found that there are some significant risks posed by bearing conspicuous sexual signals, and that there is a variety of ways in which body color can be used plastically to benefit anoles.

Our work is based on natural history observations, and so we tend to follow where the anoles lead. Lately, that has led us down the path of examining their antipredator adaptations. We are investigating the fascinating underwater diving and rebreathing behaviors of the semi-aquatic anoles, from ecological and physiological perspectives. We documented that some semi-aquatic anole species spend considerable time underwater when pursued. Our interest in antipredator strategies includes a focus on the mechanics of escaping predators, whether that is by swimming, diving, running, or leaping. Semi-aquatic anoles are also remarkably cold tolerant and have very low body temperatures, and so we also investigate their thermal ecology and possible effects of climate change. 

How and why did you start studying anoles? 

 Allergies, initially! I kept anoles as pets almost my entire childhood because a cat or dog was out of the question. Back then, I spent an embarrassing number of hours just watching what anoles did in their tanks. This cemented anoles in my head as the coolest possible lizards Years later, after spending all of my research life studying other cool herps, I stumbled upon anoles again on a teaching trip to Costa Rica. From the moment I saw Anolis aquaticus in the streams, they completely captured my attention. Their habitat and behaviors were so unique from what I had learned about anoles, I knew I had to make them a priority.

What do you love most about studying anoles? 

Two things. Their remarkable adaptations – how evolution has so astoundingly shaped them to particular environments. I love how much is known, but also how much is still unknown about their morphological, physiological, and behavioral traits – I love the element of surprise! Second, I’m still fascinated by simply watching their interactions with one another, which I could do for hours. 

What is your favorite anole species? 

 I absolutely have a favorite – Anolis aquaticus. They’re such quirky representatives of the mere handful of semi-aquatic anoles out there.

Where can people learn more about you and follow you online? 

Website: www.lindseyswierk.com

Twitter: @LindseySwierk

Instagram: lindseyswierk

Where do you work and what do you do?  

 I am a PhD candidate in the Department of Genetics at the University of Georgia. I am doing my thesis research in the lab of Dr. Doug Menke. My research is focused on studying how genes are regulated to build parts of the body during embryonic development, and how changes during embryogenesis can lead to the evolution of novel forms and structures.

What aspects of anole biology do you study, and what have you learned? 

 I am studying the genetic and developmental processes underlying the morphology of limbs in anoles. Although the ecology and evolution of these lizards has been extensively studied, we know relatively little about the underlying mechanisms that have contributed to the evolution of different structures within this genus. One of the most apparent differences among anole species is limb size, which is adapted for the particular microhabitat that each species resides within. Differences observed in adult limb lengths between several species of anoles seem to be due to changes that occur early in embryonic development. I’ve learned that since the genes and signaling pathways underlying limb development are highly conserved, changes in gene regulation may underlie many of the differences in limb morphology observed between species. My current work is focused on comparing DNA sequences in the genomes of different species to find regions involved in regulating genes important for the development and evolution of limb morphology.

How and why did you start studying anoles? 

When I first joined the Menke lab at UGA, our efforts were transitioning into more studies in anoles. I instantly fell in love with the brown anole as a model organism for studies of evolutionary developmental (evo-dev) biology.

What do you love most about studying anoles? 

 For the past few decades, studies of gene function in reptiles have lagged behind other major vertebrate groups. I enjoy being able to contribute to establishing the brown anole as an emerging model organism to investigate the genetic and molecular mechanisms of evolution in reptiles. I am also happy to get out of the lab every once in a while to catch anoles and bring them back for us to study!

What is your favorite anole species? 

 Tough to choose of course, but Anolis grahami is one of my favorites because of its striking colors of greens and blues. 

Where can people learn more about you and follow you online? 

Website: aaronevodevo.wixsite.com/aaronevodevo

Twitter: @aaronevodevo

Instagram: @aaronevodevo

Where do you work and what do you do?

 I work at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. I teach courses on evolution and vertebrate biology, and I lead a lab of undergraduate scientists studying lizard behavior and physiology. We combine approaches from ecology, evolution, and neuroscience to understand how and why lizards behave the way they do.

What aspects of anole biology do you study, and what have you learned? 

 One of the main areas of my research is the evolution of behavioral mechanisms, and we generally focus on how muscles allow different species to behave in different ways.  A surprising result from this work has been that anole species that use a muscle frequently don’t usually have larger muscles than species that use the muscle rarely. Instead, we found that muscles that move bigger structures are bigger than muscles that move smaller structures, no matter how often the muscle is used. This highlights how different lizard muscles seem to be from muscles in mammals and birds.

Another aspect of our work focuses on how a lizard’s social and physical environment affects how it behaves. We’ve studied why green anoles change their body color, how anoles communicate to form a social hierarchy, how anoles respond to artificial light at night, and many other questions. 

How and why did you start studying anoles? 

 In college, I became fascinated with studying evolution on islands, because I thought islands were where the most exciting evolutionary stories were being discovered. I had never studied anoles before graduate school, but since I joined Jonathan Losos’ lab as a PhD student, they’ve been the focus of almost all my research.

What do you love most about studying anoles? 

 As a behavioral ecologist, my favorite part of studying anoles is watching what they do in the field. I’ve found that observing a single lizard for an hour can often lead to surprising findings, and by combining lots of those observations, we can get a rich understanding of how lizards interact with each other.

What is your favorite anole species? 

 My favorite anole is Anolis bahorucoensis, a lizard that lives in montane forests in the Dominican Republic. They have tiny dewlaps, but their bodies are so vibrantly colored – green and blue and black and yellow and orange.

Where can people learn more about you and follow you online? 

Lab Website: www.johnsonlizardlab.org

Outreach Website: www.lizardsandfriends.org

Twitter: @LizardMichele