Weapon performance determines mating success in the collared lizard
In territorial species with polygynous mating systems, reproductive success reflects phenotypic variation. At the gross level, such phenotypic variation can include that of body size and weapon morphology, as well as of weapon function and performance. In a study published in the September issue of The American Naturalist, A. Kristopher Lappin (Northern Arizona University) and Jerry F. Hus...Lizard 'third eye' sheds light on evolution of color vision
Published in the March 17 issue of Science, their lizard study describes how the "side-blotched" lizard's so-called third, or parietal, eye, distinguishes two different colors, blue and green, possibly to tell the time of day. Specialized nerve cells in that eye, which looks more like a spot on the lizard's forehead, use two types of molecular signals to sense light: those found only in simpler...Nice guys do finish first in lizards' evolutionary race
Getting beaten up by the neighborhood bully so your buddy can get some tail may seem like a rough life, but it not only works for some lizards, it also gives a fascinating peek into hard-wired altruism in evolutionary biology. Side-blotched lizards spend their year on earth looking to reproduce, and their strategies have lessons about evolution. An article in the May 9 edition of the Proce...Pressured by predators, lizards see rapid shift in natural selection
Countering the widespread view of evolution as a process played out over the course of eons, evolutionary biologists have shown that natural selection can turn on a dime -- within months -- as a population's needs change. In a study of island lizards exposed to a new predator, the scientists found that natural selection dramatically changed direction over a very short time, within a single genera...Lizards 'shout' against a noisy background
Lizards that signal to rivals with a visual display "shout" to get their point across, UC Davis researchers have found. Male anole lizards signal ownership of their territory by sitting up on a tree trunk, bobbing their heads up and down and extending a colorful throat pouch. They can spot a rival lizard up to 25 meters away, said Terry Ord, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Davis who is wor...More Lizards, Including Pets, Found Venomous
In a startling discovery, researchers have found that more lizard families than assumed till now are venomous, including several species that are popular pets. // The researchers, writing in the journal Nature (published online on Nov. 16), revealed that the symptoms like pain and swelling from lizard bites, which were previously attributed to the bacteria that thrive on bits of meat le...Lizard Mothers Dress Their Progeny to Ensure Success in Later Life
A new study has found that lizard mothers dress their children in different colour patterns, which guarantees success under the conditions that the babies will face as adults . Researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, have found that female side-blotched lizards are able to induce different colour patterns in their broods in response to social cues, 'dressing' their...