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A new, morphologically cryptic, leaf-nesting frog of the genus Phyllomedusa
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Male holotype of Phyllomedusa chaparroi sp. nov. (MUBI 13986) Casttoviejo-Fischer and colleagues describe and name the new leaf-nesting frog, Phyllomedusa chaparroi, a medium-sized species (67.9–77.5 mm) from the Amazonian rainforests of northern Peru. Morphologically the new species is most similar to P. boliviana and P. camba, it is indistinguishable from the latter in external qualitative and quantitative…
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Brazilian microteiids – and the increase of Brazilian lizard species since 1995
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Gymnophthalmus underwoodi, a widespread all-female species. In a new paper, Ribeiro-Junior and Amaral present distribution data of all Alopoglossidae and Gymnophthalmidae lizards known from the Brazilian Amazonia. The paper presents a total of 54 species-level taxa, belonging to 17 genera and two families. This represents 22 more species-level taxa than previously reported. The results were…
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Do not publish
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David Lindenmayer, Ben ScheeleScience 26 May 2017:Vol. 356, Issue 6340, pp. 800-801DOI: 10.1126/science.aan1362 Biologists have long valued publishing detailed information on rare and endangered species. Until relatively recently, much of this information was accessible only through accessing specialized scientific journals in university libraries. However, much of these data have been transferred online with the advent of…
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Call to keep secrets on rare species draws reluctant support
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By Warren CornwallMay. 25, 2017 , 2:00 PM The extent to which rare animal poachers piggyback on scientific research became clear to Mark Auliya soon after he published a 2012 paper announcing the discovery of the Borneo earless monitor lizard (Lanthanotus borneensis) in a new part of the southeast Asian island. The conservation biologist at the…
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Cuban boas coordinate their hunting behavior
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Snakes have long been thought to be solitary hunters. A new study from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, shows that the Cuban boa (Chilabothrus angulifer) coordinate their hunts to increase their chances of success. Vladimir Dinets, a research assistant professor of psychology at the University of Tennessee, observed Cuban Boa’s hunting behavior in bat caves.…
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Coral snake mimic loses pattern in absences of coral snake model
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Tobago’s Erythrolamprus ocellatus above. Trinidad’s coral snake mimic E. aesculapii below. Losses of adaptations in response to changed selective pressures are evolutionarily important phenomena but relatively few empirical examples have been investigated in detail. To help fill this gap, Hodson and Lehtinen took advantage of a natural experiment in which coral snake mimics occur on two…
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The last European varanid
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The Desert Monitor, Varanus griseus is the extant species with the closest distribution to Europe today In a recent paper, Georgalis et al. (2017) report the remains of a varanid lizard from the middle Pleistocene of the Tourkobounia 5 locality near Athens, Greece. The new fossil material comprises cranial elements only (one maxilla, one dentary, and…
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Some monitor lizards have not recovered from the introduction of the cane toad
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Varanus panoptes Image credit: Greg Hume The impact of invasive species is often underestimated by many. However, invasives can trigger trophic cascades in animal communities but published cases documenting the results of removing top predators are extremely rare. An exception is the invasive cane toad (Rhinella marina) in Australia, which has caused severe population declines in…
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Norisophis begaa, a new basal snake from the early Cretaceous
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Image credits: Tyler Keillor (sculpture) and Ximena Erickson (original photography); modified by Bonnie Miljour. Klein et al. (2017) note that fossil snakes are well represented in the Upper Cretaceous of northern Africa (99.7 to 94.3 MYA), with material known from Morocco, Sudan, Egypt, Libya, Algeria, and Niger. The Moroccan Kem Kem beds have yielded a…
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The rediscover of some Brazilian anoles and their biogeographic significance
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Brazil’s Atlantic Forest has montane ranges with an exceptionally high diversity of endemic amphibians and reptiles. Connections between this area and other areas of South America have been proposed as reason. In a new paper Ivan Prates and colleagues report the the rediscovery of Anolis nasofrontalis and Anolis pseudotigrinus, two mainland species from the Brazilian…
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First warm blooded vertebrate, Ophiacodon?
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Ophiacodon mirus. Image Credit ru.wikapedia People who like watching lizards often get the best opportunity to do so in the morning, as they can usually be found sunbathing at this time of day. This is because they rely on an external energy supply to reach their operating temperature. However, mice and other mammals make themselves…
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