Tag: endemic

#DidYouAnole – Anolis acutus

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On October 8, 2021

In All Posts


Photo: Manuel Leal

Hi!

Turns out grad school eats up a lot of your time some weeks. Who knew!

So here is a pretty cool Caribbean anole this week. Anolis acutus, the Sharp Anole is endemic to St. Croix. These anoles are tan to olive in colour. Their dewlaps are white with a large yellow-orange blotch closer to the body. Males have an average SVL of 67mm and females, about 49mm.


Photo: Brett, iNaturalist

They are territorial and maintain hierarchies within their habitats. If an individual is removed, they become slightly agitated until the territory is taken over by a new anole or the individual returns (Ruibal & Philibosian, 1974). The adults also tend to be sedentary and have a perch height hierarchy, but exclude juveniles from occupied trees leaving them to find and occupy empty ones or live on the ground (Ruibal & Philibosian, 1974).

St Croix anoles appear to be eurythermal, meaning they have a broad temperature range (McManus & Nellis, 1973).


Photo: nolafrog, iNaturalist

#DidYouAnole – Anolis gingivinus

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On August 26, 2021

In All Posts


Photo: Kerry Ross, iNaturalist

Hello and welcome to my first post since officially starting as a grad student!
I think I’ve got my schedule down and we can get back to regular weekly anoles. Love that for us!

This week’s anole, Anolis gingivinus is also called the Anguilla Bank anole or Anguilla anole and is endemic to Anguilla and its satellite islands.
The Anguillan anole is reported to adapt well to anthropogenic effects on its habitat (Hailey et al, 2011) and to different niches, although its ecomorph affinities lie closest to being trunk-ground. They also seem to be abundant despite being heavily preyed on by American kestrels.


Photo: John Sullivan, iNaturalist

Male Anguillan anoles have an average SVL of 72mm and females have an average of 53mm. They are usually olive to greyish in colour with bright orange dewlaps, and have bold dorsal and lighter flank stripes. They also occasionally sport some green on their lower halves and males may have darker marbled spotting along their bodies. Anolis gingivinus are insectivorous but like many other anoles will eat smaller lizards.


Photo: Rozilber, iNaturalist

Three in The Bed: a Curious Case of a Shared Sleeping Perch in a Neotropical Anole

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On July 8, 2018

In Anole Photographs, Natural History Observations, New Research, Notes from the Field

Opposite views of a communal sleeping event (1 male, 2 females) of Anolis cusuco at Parque Nacional Cusuco, Departamento Cortes, Honduras (Brown & Arrivillaga, 2018)

Let’s be honest: anoles are fascinating! These charismatic and well-adapted lizards are always a pleasure to watch and document. Better yet, no matter how well you think you know a species, they’re still always full of surprises.

The sleeping behavior of anoline lizards is a fascinating aspect of their natural history, and a growing amount of literature has detailed species-specific sleeping activities.  Typically, anoles are considered solitary sleepers owing to their territorial nature,  but ‘behind closed doors,’ this may not always be the case!

For those curious,  a recent  ‘behavioral oddity’ published in Mesoamerican Herpetology  by Brown & Arrivillaga (2018), reported an example of three individual Anolis (Norops) cusuco sleeping together on a perch! The individuals were so close that portions of their bodies overlapped! Strange, indeed; this observation contrasts the typical view of anole sleeping ecology, territoriality and indeed that what is known for this species (Clause & Brown, 2017).  In over 5 years of visiting Cusuco NP (observing countless solitary sleeping A. cusuco), imagine the surprise in finding these anoles having a sneaky snuggle!!

As we wrote: “Although a conclusive explanation is not available, we suggest that because the sleeping group consisted of one male and two females, that the shared perch might have been breeding-related. This situation might be associated with the overlap of male and female territories, or by the anoles awakening close to necessary resources. Conceivably, however, courtship might have been interrupted by nightfall, and the orientation of the sleeping male ensured that courting would continue the following morning.”

 

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