tagged w/ Lizards
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CBS News...
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‘Major Wildlife Trafficker’ Gets 21 Months For Smuggling Live Turtles, Tortoises In Snack Food Boxes
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April 30, 2012 1:30 PM
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LOS ANGELES (CBS) — A man federal authorities call “a major wildlife trafficker” was sentenced Monday to 21 months in federal prison for smuggling 55 live turtles and tortoises inside snack food boxes into the United States last year.
Atushi Yamagami, 39, of Osaka, Japan, was sentenced Monday morning and additionally ordered to pay a $19,403 criminal fine.
Yamagami pleaded guilty to smuggling the 55 reptiles from Japan in August. Most of the smuggled animals were species protected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species.
Federal prosecutors had also argued that the method of cramming the turtles into snack food packages, that were then stuffed into suitcases, constituted animal cruelty and that the animals posed the risk of transmitting salmonella.
Since his arrest at Los Angeles International Airport in January 2011, Yamagami has been held without bail.
Federal agents say Yamagami was the leader of an organized group of Japanese nationals responsible for smuggling protected turtles, tortoises, chameleons and lizards into and out of the U.S., primarily through airports in Honolulu and Los Angeles. After smuggling them into the country, Yamagami would sell or trade them at reptile shows across the U.S., using the proceeds to buy snakes, turtles and tortoises native to North America, prosecutors said.
An investigation determined that between 2004 and 2011, Yamagami and his couriers took 42 trips to and from the U.S., according to federal agents.
Norihide Ushirozako and Hiroki Uetsuki, two of Yamagami’s couriers from Osaka, were arrested and prosecuted for wildlife smuggling in 2011. Ushirozako was sentenced in August to time served — approximately seven months — and Uetsuki was also sentenced to time served, approximately six months.
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‘Major Wildlife Trafficker’ Gets 21 Months For... more
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Lizards can be every bit as clever as mammals and birds. They could learn how to solve novel problems, challenging the widely-held view that reptiles have limited brain power.
link:http://in.news.yahoo.com/problem-solving-lizards-clever-mammals-102555404.html;_ylt=Ane.VnTFgnDGpxVuSOp4DS27scB_;_ylu=X3oDMTNzcTdyNTN1BHBrZwNjOTk3ZmEwYy0zZjc5LTMwODQtYTA1Yy04OTMzNDA3NjAxNzkEcG9zAzEEc2VjA1NlY3Rpb25MaXN0IEZQIFNjaWVuY2VUZWNobm9sb2d5BHZlcgM1YjQzMDViMC1hZTg0LTExZTAtYmIzZi1kZjljN2ExZTk5YTY-;_ylg=X3oDMTFlbGJ1cmZrBGludGwDaW4EbGFuZwNlbi1pbgRwc3RhaWQDBHBzdGNhdAMEcHQDc2VjdGlvbnM-;_ylv=3Lizards can be every bit as clever as mammals and birds. They could learn how to solve... more
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Los Angeles Times...
San Francisco considers banning the sale of all pets
The proposal started with dogs and cats, expanded to birds and hamsters, and now includes any animal that walks, flies, swims, crawls or slithers — unless you plan to eat it.
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By Maria L. La Ganga, Los Angeles Times
June 26, 2011, 6:29 p.m.
Reporting from San Francisco—
The first vision was simple and straightforward: To curtail puppy mills and kitten factories, the sale of cats and dogs should be banned in San Francisco, where the loving guardians of animal companions come to regular blows — politically — with the loving parents of children.
The ban was put on hold last year after animal advocates broadened it to include anything with fur or feathers. Now it's back, with a new name and a new strategy: More is more. The Humane Pet Acquisition Proposal is on its way to the Board of Supervisors, and it hopes to protect everything from Great Danes to goldfish.
Yes, goldfish. And guppies, gobies, gouramies, glowlight tetras, German blue rams. No fish, no fowl, no reptiles, no amphibians, no cats, no dogs, no gerbils, no rats. If it flies, crawls, runs, swims or slithers, you would not be able to buy it in the city named for the patron saint of animals.
Representatives of the $45-billion to $50-billion-a-year pet industry call the San Francisco proposal "by far the most radical ban we've seen" nationwide and argue that it would force small operators to close. Animal activists say it will save small but important lives, along with taxpayer money, and end needless suffering.
"Why fish? Why not fish?" said Philip Gerrie, a member of the city's Commission of Animal Control and Welfare and a coauthor of the proposal. "From Descartes on up, in the Western mindset, fish and other nonhuman animals don't have feelings, they don't have emotions, we can do whatever we want to them. If we considered them living beings, we would deal with them differently.… Our culture sanctions this, treating them as commodities and expendable."
The commission voted earlier this month to send a proposal to the Board of Supervisors recommending a ban on the sale of all pets in the city to shore up the adoption of unwanted creatures from shelters and rescue organizations. Commissioners are now looking for a supervisor or two to sponsor such an ordinance.
Snake food was almost exempt from the proposal. After all, pythons have to eat, and they like their lunch alive. But at a heated meeting, Commissioner Pam Hemphill questioned how it could be humane to sell live animals to be fed to other live animals.
"If a snake is caught with a rodent in a box, the rodent can scratch its eye and cause an infection," said Hemphill, who noted that reptiles on display at the California Academy of Sciences eat dead, frozen prey. "The snake can't escape, and the rodent might be stuck for one or two days in the box with the snake because the snake's not hungry right then.
"So it doesn't seem very humane to me," she continued. "And if the frozen [food] works, then I think the killing of the animals to be food is probably more humane."
It is legal in San Francisco to sell live animals for eventual human consumption, and the proposed ban would not stop markets from selling live fish, poultry, turtles or seafood for that purpose.
Rebecca Katz, director of San Francisco Animal Care and Control, said her agency supports a ban on pet sales — particularly one that includes the so-called smalls, such as hamsters, which are euthanized at her city shelter at a higher percentage than any other domesticated animal. Although she did not advocate for the inclusion of fish, she is not against it.
"We're the agency that receives the old, filthy fish bowl with the goldfish at risk and have to determine whether we can make them healthy and adopt them out or flush them down the toilet," Katz said. "These are the lucky ones. Most people just flush them themselves."
Jennifer Scarlett, a veterinarian and co-president of the San Francisco SPCA, notes that only a handful of stores in San Francisco sell animals of any kind and that the effect of a ban would be largely symbolic. But she said that symbolism, and the conversation that it raises, is critical in improving the lives of millions of helpless creatures.
"For us as an organization, we've identified the larger problem of online purchasing of dogs, and we hope this is an avenue to get to that," she said. Still, when it comes to birds and fish, "there's a lot of cruelty around where they are sourced from. We see the cruelty."
But Jonathan Ito finds the proposal to be far more than symbolic. To the owner of Animal Connection — who has sold fish, birds, reptiles, amphibians, rats, mice and hamsters for a generation — the ban is a threat to his livelihood.
"It would put us out of business and our employees out of work," said Ito, who believes there is "no cause and effect" to the proposal.
Pet stores, he said, do not cause overcrowding at the shelters. They do not promote impulse buys of small, cute creatures that will later be tossed aside by bored children. And they work hard to educate prospective pet owners.
"The animal-rights activists are trying to drive a wedge any way they can in order to get a foothold on changing the ownership of animals," Ito said. "They don't believe they should be bred. They don't believe people are responsible to care for them.… They are about eliminating animals as pets."
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PHOTO: Jonathan Ito is the owner of Animal Connection in the Sunset District. The city's Commission of Animal Control and Welfare voted earlier this month to send a proposal to the Board of Supervisors recommending a ban on the sale of all pets in the city to shore up the adoption of unwanted creatures from shelters and rescue organizations. (David Butow, For The Times / June 22, 2011)Los Angeles Times...
San Francisco considers banning the sale of all pets
The... more
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45 Australian Species Face Extinction in 20 Years
by David DeFranza, Washington, DC on 03.24.11
wild donkeys photo
Photo credit: asibiri/Creative Commons
For decades, the remote Kimberley region of Northern Australia has stood as a stronghold for dozens of rare native species of mammals, birds, lizards and other vertebrates. Now, these species are under serious threat from encroaching invasive species and a series of fires.
The pressure is so severe, researchers believe, that as many as 45 species could face extinction within 20 years.
"We're in the midst of a massive extinction event in Australia and the north has really been the last stronghold for many species of birds and mammals and reptiles," Tara Martin, a researcher with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, said, "the Kimberley is really their last chance on Earth."
SLIDESHOW: The World's Most Lovable Invasive Species [Click on link above.]
The threat, a new report explains, comes from feral cats, wild donkeys, and a series of forest fires. The cats, researchers found, are opportunistic hunters devastating native populations. Donkeys and goats compete for the scarce food and water resources in the region.
The simplest means of defense, conservationists say, is to reduce the population of goats and donkeys. Educating the public on the impact stray house cats have on local ecosystems is also critical.45 Australian Species Face Extinction in 20 Years
by David DeFranza, Washington, DC... more
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Scientists claimed to have discovered that a small Tasmanian lizard has different ways of determining the sex of its offspring, depending on the altitude.
At low altitudes, the lizard's gender is determined by temperature, while at high altitudes where the climate is more extreme, it's all down to their genes, ABC reported qouting a study in"Nature". http://www.indiareport.com/India-usa-uk-news/latest-news/925336/FeaturedArticles/14/54/14Scientists claimed to have discovered that a small Tasmanian lizard has different ways... more
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Geckos Mark Historic Find for LA County
Father-son herpetology team uncovers non-native Mediterranean house gecko
By JOSH STEINER
Updated 11:15 AM PDT, Fri, Oct 1, 2010
Will and Reese Bernstein
The first notable discovery for the Natural History Museum’s Lost Lizards of LA survey has been made near Chatsworth.
According to the Natural History Museum, an amateur father-son team of herpetologists Will and Reese Bernstein discovered a population of non-native Mediterranean House Geckos.
The Bernstein’s attended the museum’s lizard hunt this spring in Hancock and Exposition Park when the LLOLA project began. After, they returned home to the Valley to continue their search.
After they submitted their results, their discoveries were initially believed to be a Western Branded Gecko. However on closer inspection, Cal State Northridge herpetologist and LLOLA consultant Dr. Robert Espinoza ruled that the species was actually the Mediterranean House Gecko, according to Natural History Museum statement:
Although the two species are superficially similar in color pattern, the local banded geckos (1) lack toe pads, (2) have eyelids, and (3) don't have bumpy warts (tubercles). As their name implies, Mediterranean House Geckos are not native to the area. But they have been widely introduced throughout the U.S. (including Hawaii), particularly in the southeast.
After a search of local records, Espinoza determined that this was the first discovery of this particular species in Los Angeles County. There have been 23 records of the Gecko in California, but all have come out of either San Diego or Riverside County.
The Bernstein’s discovery, in addition to other LLOLA findings, will be on display during the second annual Reptile and Amphibian Appreciation Day on Sunday, Oct 3 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.Geckos Mark Historic Find for LA County
Father-son herpetology team uncovers... more
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Katherine Heigl pledges $1 million to help animal shelters
People
September 24, 2010 5:17 p.m. EDT
Photo: Katherine Heigl plays with a pooch at a press conference on September 23.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
* Katherine Heigl donates $1 million to help no-cost spay and neuter programs in L.A.
* More than 50,000 of 80,000 shelter animals in L.A. County were euthanized last year
(PEOPLE.com) -- It's more than just puppy love. Katherine Heigl is behind a $1 million initiative to help no-cost spay and neuter programs in the Los Angeles area.
The Jason Debus Heigl Foundation, named in memory of the actress's late brother, will work with the Cesar Millan's Millan Foundation, the City and County of Los Angeles and various other organizations on the project, called the Compassion Revolution.
Heigl, who herself has six dogs, three of them rescues, told PEOPLEPets.com at the press conference to announce the pledge that she and her mother had felt hopeless and overwhelmed by the pet population crisis in L.A.
Over 50,000 of 80,000 shelter animals in Los Angeles County were euthanized last year, according to the Heigl Foundation.
"How can we change the results for these animals?" she said. "[Shelters are not only] euthanizing sick, old dogs. It's gotten brutal, you know. It's inhuman, really."
The Heigl Foundation wanted a solution -- training and education on how to reduce the pet population compassionately, instead of having to put down healthy animals. Heigl says that her upbringing influenced her when it came to the importance of spaying and neutering.
"When I was growing up, my mother and father had zero desire for any one of our animals to have a litter," she said. "I think it's a lot of work, it's a lot of energy. Then, as an adult, because of the way I was raised and because I had the means to do it, [spaying and neutering] goes without question.
"But there are a lot of communities that don't have that education, weren't raised that way and don't see their pets that way," she added. "They have no idea that a litter of 10 means a litter of, like, 400 in the future. We can tell them and educate them, and provide a way for them to spay and neuter their pets."
For more information on the initiative, visit compassion-revolution.com.
See the full article at PEOPLE.comKatherine Heigl pledges $1 million to help animal shelters
People
September 24, 2010... more
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Brian Handwerk
for National Geographic News
Published September 1, 2010
"Evolution has been caught in the act, according to scientists who are decoding how a species of Australian lizard is abandoning egg-laying in favor of live birth.
Along the warm coastal lowlands of New South Wales (map), the yellow-bellied three-toed skink lays eggs to reproduce. But individuals of the same species living in the state's higher, colder mountains are almost all giving birth to live young.
Only two other modern reptiles—another skink species and a European lizard—use both types of reproduction. (Related: "Virgin Birth Expected at Christmas—By Komodo Dragon.")
Evolutionary records shows that nearly a hundred reptile lineages have independently made the transition from egg-laying to live birth in the past, and today about 20 percent of all living snakes and lizards give birth to live young only."
To read the full article follow this link:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/100901-science-animals-evolution-australia-lizard-skink-live-birth-eggs/Brian Handwerk
for National Geographic News
Published September 1, 2010... more
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Sell a guinea pig, go to jail.
That's the law under consideration by San Francisco's Commission of Animal Control and Welfare. If the commission approves the ordinance at its meeting tonight, San Francisco could soon have what is believed to be the country's first ban on the sale of all pets except fish.
That includes dogs, cats, hamsters, mice, rats, chinchillas, guinea pigs, birds, snakes, lizards and nearly every other critter, or, as the commission calls them, companion ani....
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/07/08/MN9L1EAT90.DTLSell a guinea pig, go to jail.
That's the law under consideration by San... more
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ScienceDaily (May 13, 2010) — For many lizards, global climate change is a matter of life and death. After decades of surveying Sceloporus lizard populations in Mexico, an international research team has found that rising temperatures have driven 12 percent of the country's lizard populations to extinction. An extinction model based on this discovery also forecasts a grim future for these ecologically important critters, predicting that a full 20 percent of all lizard species could be extinct by the year 2080.
The detailed surveys of lizard populations in Mexico, collected from 200 different sites, indicate that the temperatures in those regions have changed too rapidly for the lizards to keep pace. It seems that all types of lizards are far more susceptible to climate-warming extinction than previously thought because many species are already living right at the edge of their thermal limits, especially at low elevation and low latitude range limits.
Although the researchers' prediction for 2080 could change if humans are able to slow global climate warming, it does appear that lizards have crossed a threshold for extinctions -- and that their sharp decline will continue for decades at least.
Barry Sinervo from the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of California in Santa Cruz, along with colleagues from across the globe, reached these conclusions after comparing their field studies of the lizards in Mexico with extensive data from around the world. Their research will be published in the May 14 issue of Science, the peer-reviewed journal published by AAAS, the nonprofit science society.
After compiling the global field data, Sinervo and his colleagues studied the effects of rising temperatures on lizards' bodies, and created a model of extinction risks for various lizard species around the world. Their model accurately predicted specific locations on five continents where populations of lizards have recently gone extinct, and it might inform researchers on how these patterns of extinction will continue in the future.
"How quickly can Earth's lizards adapt to the rising global temperatures? That's the important question," Sinervo said. "We are actually seeing lowland species moving upward in elevation, slowly driving upland species extinct, and if the upland species can't evolve fast enough then they're going to continue to go extinct."
According to the researchers' global model, which is derived from today's trends of carbon dioxide emissions from human activities, about six percent of lizard species are due for extinction by the year 2050. Since carbon dioxide hangs around in the atmosphere for decades, the researchers say that this statistic can no longer be avoided. However, they do say that concentrated global efforts to reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could possibly avert the 2080 scenarios, in which 20 percent of lizard species are expected to disappear from the planet.
The detailed study notes specifically that lizards that bear live young are particularly at risk of extinction, compared to those that lay eggs. "Live-bearers experience almost twice the risk of egg-layers largely because live-bearers have evolved lower body temperatures that heighten extinction risk," Sinervo said. "We are literally watching these species disappear before our eyes."
Sinervo began focusing his attention on lizard extinctions after he noticed an obvious trend during his field work in France. He identified an unsettling pattern of lizard extinctions with French researchers, Jean Clobert and Benoit Heulin, while they were surveying some of their well-documented populations. Disturbed by their findings, they contacted colleagues around the world -- Jack Sites and Donald Miles in the United States, Fausto Méndez-de-la-Cruz in Mexico, and Carlos Frederico Duarte Rocha in Brazil -- and a global collaboration ensued.
"This work is a fine example of interdisciplinary science and international collaboration, using methods and data from a range of scientific disciplines to improve confidence in the prediction of the biological effects of contemporary climate change, and in particular showing how long-term records and research are so crucial to the understanding of ecological change," said Andrew Sugden, the International Managing Editor of Science.
"We would never have been able to do this without certain free, online tools like Google Scholar and Google Earth," Sinervo said. "It took us awhile to pinpoint the appropriate search terms. But once we did, we locked onto key published studies. I was surprised at how fast researchers began sending us data… That's what happens though: When scientists see a problem, with global evidence backing it, they come together."
In order to fine-tune their model with this surprising global outpouring of data, Sinervo and his colleagues used a small electronic device that mimics the body temperature of a lizard basking in the sun. They placed these thermal models in sun-drenched areas for four months at sites in Mexico where lizard populations were still thriving -- and at sites where they have already gone extinct.
"There are periods of the day when lizards can't be out, and essentially have to retreat to cooler places," Sinervo said. "When they're not out and about, lizards aren't foraging for food. So we assessed how many hours of the day lizards would have been driven out of the sun at these different locations. Then, we were able to parameterize our global model."
For the authors, who claim a deep appreciation for these lizards and the important role the reptiles play in the global food chain, these findings are both "devastating and heart-wrenching." But, they say, hope does remain for the world's lizards.
"If the governments of the world can implement a concerted change to limit our carbon dioxide emissions, then we could bend the curve and hold levels of extinction to the 2050 scenarios," Sinervo concluded. "But it has to be a global push… I don't want to tell my child that we once had a chance to save these lizards, but we didn't. I want to do my best to save them while I can."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100513143447.htmScienceDaily (May 13, 2010) — For many lizards, global climate change is a... more
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Kurta
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It appears in the Philippine forests that a new, giant lizard species has been officially discovered. Coming in at 6 feet long and weighing roughly 22 pounds, it may have been so elusive because it spends most of its time in the trees. The new species, unlike its carnivorous cousin the Komodo Dragon, is a vegetarian, hence why it spends so much time in the trees.
How one misses a 6 foot long giant lizard for so long is beyond me. Makes you realize just how vast and diverse these forests really are.It appears in the Philippine forests that a new, giant lizard species has been... more
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Philippines
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100406/sc_afp/sciencespeciesreptilephilippines;_ylt=A0wNdO4LrrtLbCoByy6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTQ1ajFmdGdsBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDEwMDQwNi9zY2llbmNlc3BlY2llc3JlcHRpbGVwaGlsaXBwaW5lcwRjY29kZQNtb3N0cG9wdWxhcgRjcG9zAzkEcG9zAzYEcHQDaG9tZV9jb2tlBHNlYwN5bl9oZWFkbGluZV9saXN0BHNsawNuZXdmb3VuZGdpYW4-
Biologists on Wednesday reported the spectacular discovery of a species of giant lizard, a reptile as long as a full-grown man is tall, and endowed with a double penis.
The secretive but brightly-coloured beast, a monitor lizard, is a close cousin of the Komodo Dragon of Indonesia.
But unlike the fearsone Dragon, it is not a carnivore, nor does it feast on rotting meat. Instead, it is entirely peaceable and tucks into fruit.
Dubbed Varanus bitatawa, the lizard measures two metres (6.5 feet) in length, according to the account, published by Britain's Royal Society.
It was found in a river valley on northern Luzon Island in the Philippines, surviving loss of habitat and hunting by local people who use it for food.
How many of the lizards have survived is unclear.
The species is almost certainly critically endangered, and might well have disappeared entirely without ever being catalogued had a large male specimen not been rescued alive from a hunter last June.
Finding such a distinctive species in a heavily populated, highly deforested location "comes as an unprecedented surprise," note the authors, writing in the journal Biology Letters.
The only finds of comparable importance in recent decades are the Kipunji monkey, which inhabits a tiny range of forest in Tanzania, and the Saola, a forest-dwelling bovine found only in Vietnam and Laos.
V. bitatawa has unique markings and an unusual sexual anatomy, according to the study.
Its scaly body and legs are a blue-black mottled with pale yellow-green dots, while its tail is marked in alternating segments of black and green.
Males have a double penis, called hemipenes, also found in some snakes and other lizards.
The two penises are often used in alternation, and sometimes contain spines or hooks that serve to anchor the male within the female during intercourse.
V. bitatawa has a relative in southern Luzon, V. olivaceus, but the species are separated by three river valleys and a gap of 150 kilometers (95 miles) and may never have met up.
One reason that the new lizard has gone undetected, the researchers speculate, is that it never leaves the forests of its native Sierra Madre mountains to traverse open spaces.
The discovery "adds to the recognition of the Philippines as a global conservation hotspot and a regional superpower of biodiversity," the authors conclude.
The giant lizard should become a "flagship species" for conservation efforts aimed at preserving the remaining forests of northern Luzon, which are rapidly disappearing under the pressure of expanding human population and deforestation.
http://d.yimg.com/a/p/afp/20100406/capt.photo_1270569312304-1-0.jpg?x=213&y=94&xc=1&yc=1&wc=408&hc=180&q=85&sig=AjtOKdi.gl3WFBEvroURZg--Philippines... more
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Saturday's edition of my three times a week talk show.Watch the show here on CURRENT TV on Tues, Thurs & Sats.
JOIN ME ON MONDAY'S @ 12pm in the afternoon FOR THE LIVE SHOW at : http://www.unitedkingdomradio.co.uk . You can join in LIVE by SKYPE,email or telephone.
LIVE music a talk show. Listen on Mon - Fri 10am - 11am UK time at :
http://www.heartheswish.com/digitalpl...
In today's show :
Gardeners - watch out for the frosts.
The council tax bill arrives.
People just start talking to you.
Let's try tomatoes again.
Now I'm gonna tell you a secret - please don't tell the authorities.
What do you grow ?
Iguana's are cute.
Big bags of soil on special offer.
Are we supposed to be grateful for monthly payments ?
All living things are beautiful.
Different varieties.
Is it always cold in Russia ?
Rabbiting on.
"Undercover Princess".
No mention of the wages the people get at the council.
Pushing a very heavy trolley.
They give themselves rises.
I've hurt my back.
They eat insects.
25% discount.
There is always huge queues at the tills.
A single person.
Longacres garden centre.
Minature Dinosaurs.
Tick the box.
New ladder.
Millie likes "Animal Kingdom".
Her with the four legs & a tail.
In a week, it's grown three inches.
At last the temperature has increased.
chris@unitedkingdomtalk.co.uk
WWW.UNITEDKINGDOMTALK.CO.UKSaturday's edition of my three times a week talk show.Watch the show here on... more
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With Madagascar containing nearly two-third's of the world's chameleon species, Christopher Raxworthy, Associate Curator of Herpetology at the American Museum of Natural History, recently embarked on an expedition to the island in search of these special lizards.With Madagascar containing nearly two-third's of the world's chameleon... more
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A man was caught by Norwegian customs carrying a tarantula in his bag, and a further 14 royal pythons and 10 albino leopard geckos taped to his body.A man was caught by Norwegian customs carrying a tarantula in his bag, and a further... more
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Demand for a striking blue and red lizard has surged among comic fans thanks to its uncanny resemblance to Spiderman.
Pet shops specialising in exotic animals have reported a surge in popularity for the Mwanza Flat Headed Agama lizard, which is native to Africa.
Karen Baker, of amphibian and reptile specialist store Exotic-pets.co.uk, said that the lizards, which live for up to 15 years, had currently sold out.
She said: 'People are drawn to them because of their unusual colourings.
'These lizards usually live in groups with one dominant male who is usually the most colourful.
'We should have another batch of these lizards available in October, the demand just keeps going up and up.Demand for a striking blue and red lizard has surged among comic fans thanks to its... more
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Most lacertid lizards are content scurrying in and out of nooks and crannies in walls and between rocks. However, some have opted for an arboreal life style. Neon blue tailed tree lizards (Holaspis guentheri) leap from branch to branch as they scamper through trees in the African forest. There are even anecdotes that the tiny African tree lizards can glide. But without any obvious adaptations to help them to upgrade a leap to a glide, it wasn't clear whether the reptiles really do take to the air and, if they do, how do they remain aloft?Most lacertid lizards are content scurrying in and out of nooks and crannies in walls... more
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A visitor to the Maceretta hospital, Italy, got a bit of a shock, after he bit into canteen cheese and tomato sandwich finding it had a bit of extra garnish inside it, a dead lizard.
The poor man said: "I bit into what was supposed to be a cheese and tomato sandwich and was surprised when I tasted something a bit meaty and chewy. I looked down and saw a lizard tail sticking out of the side of the sandwich."
Mmm. Lizard sandwich!A visitor to the Maceretta hospital, Italy, got a bit of a shock, after he bit into... more
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