On August 14 we celebrate World Lizard Day. These are a fairly large group of vertebrates with thousands of species and with quite peculiar characteristics. Do you want to know what they are and why are they so interesting? Keep reading to learn more about them.
Anolis sp. Reserve Tapon Creek, Livingston, Izabal. David Arrivillaga, 2021.
Lizards are a big and widespread group of reptiles that belong to the order Squamata. There are around 12,000 species and live across the world except in Antarctica. Lizards are scaly-skinned reptiles that are distinguished from snakes because they possess legs, movable eyelids, and external ear openings. However, some species of lizard’s lack one or more of these features. Lizards are by far the most diverse group of modern reptiles in body, shape, and size. Representatives of some families are limbless and resemble snakes, whereas may be outfitted with a wide array of ornamentation such as extensible throat fans and frills, throat spines, horns or casques on the head, and tail crest.
Coleonyx elegans, gecko. Posada Caribe, Sayaxché, Petén. David Arrivillaga, 2021.
Lizards have a diverse range of habitats, from underground warrens and burrows to the surface and elevated vegetation. Some are slow, move with caution and rely on cryptic coloration for protection, whereas others can run fast across. Small species such as geckos, not only have colonized islands but also invaded cities around the world. Hemidactylus species are common in houses and buildings that most people know more about it. They appeared to do very well living with people in disturbed areas but did not seem to invade undisturbed habitats.
The department of El Progreso has unique biological diversity in the region however, that has been little known and admired by the population; since among the different ecosystems present in the department, the most outstanding is the Dry Forest, also known as thorny forest, scrubland, chaparral o xerophytic forest, alluding to its characteristic. Dry forests have generally been associated with low attractiveness, because they are composed of plant communities comprised of trees with small structures, scattered, losing their leaves during the dry season of the year, as well various shrubby plants. However, they have a unique diversity with many endemic flora and fauna species.
Dry forests in Guatemala occupy 4.49% of the country’s total area. These are being affected by the expansion of the agricultural frontier, the formation of pasture, and the extraction of wood for firewood. The research in this area is very limited, despite being one of the places with the greatest endemism in Guatemala. Even though several studies have been carried out in the dry forest, there are few records of fauna, especially for the department of El Progreso.
Calocitta formosa (White-throated magpie-jay). El Rancho, El Progreso. Edwin Solares, 2023.
Fish, crocodiles and waterbirds are the fauna most often associated with freshwater scenes in Classic Maya art. Jaguars love to swim and have water lilies decorating their heads in a Late Classic Codex Style painting. Marine shells were popular sources of jewelry for the Maya and shells are common in the murals of Cacaxtla. Marine scenes are also known from murals of Chichen Itza but our present research is on freshwater ecosystems, primarily in Peten, Guatemala.
What in the world does this photo show? If you CLICK, you will see what we found as we hiked through this savanna on April 1, 2022 as part of our 5-year project of coordination and cooperation with CONAP to study the flora, fauna, and biodiverse ecosystems of the RBM.
PNLT Savanna #13, far southeast part of Parque Nacional Laguna del Tigre, Reserva de la Biosfera Maya (RBM), Peten. Photo by Edwin Solares, FLAAR Photo Archive.
You can see LOTS of previously undocumented, previously unexplored savanna wetlands of the RBM in this week’s 36 Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala
The presentation on plants, animals and biodiverse ecosystems of Nicholas Hellmuth is this Thursday, July 20, 2023, Los ecosistemas de humedales actuales también estaban al alcance de los mayas del Periodo Clásico, 11:15 to 11:45am.
If you prefer this lecture in English, we have a 1-hour edition, all full color, to show you parts of the “jungle” that you don’t often see. He has lectured over many decades around the world: Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, across USA and Canada, UK and across EU, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, South Africa, Japan, China, Taiwan and other countries. These lectures are also available via ZOOM.
This lecture is based on over 50-years of in-person field trips and exploration of wetland ecosystems of Mesoamerica, especially in Guatemala and Mexico. The photos are mostly from our recent years of our continuing 5-year project of coordination and cooperation with CONAP to study flora, fauna, and biodiverse ecosystems in the 21,600 square kilometers of the Reserva de la Biosfera Maya.
Since vultures are occasionally pictured in Classic Maya art, we like to photograph vultures when we see them along the roads. So here is a quick snapshot.
Normally we see black vultures eating an animal that has been run over on the highway. But today (June 22, 2023) we saw these vultures at a waterhole near the highway.
PNYNN park ranger Daniel Moises Perez Diaz, known as Teco, kindly send several videos of a tapir that he saw in the “Rio” Holmul near Nakum. I put it as “Rio” since most of the year it is just a series of pools of water. They only connect and start to flow if there is a really wet rainy season.
Teco has assisted the projects of FLAAR for several years. We provide him a camera, mobile phone also with camera, and cover the cost of monthly Internet so he can send key photos and videos to us.
It helps when a project on flora, fauna, ecosystems or any other related topic works together with local people in Peten.
In the many decades in wetland areas of Guatemala I have never had the luck to see a tapir in the wild. Thus I initiated getting to know the tapirs in the Auto Safari Chapin.
In addition to doing biological and ecological research, we at FLAAR (USA) and FLAAR Mesoamerica (Guatemala) also have a division for preparing books and posts on flora and fauna and ecosystems for school children in Guatemala.
At the bottom is the front cover of our MayanToons post about fun facts of the tapir.
Over the past years the aquatic reptiles in Classic Maya art have sometimes been called caiman or called alligator. Fortunately, other archaeologists and iconographers correctly call the Maya reptiles a crocodile. The biology and iconography team at FLAAR Mesoamerica are preparing a PowerPoint presentation to show that it is usually crocodiles that are pictured in the pre-Columbian art of the Maya, Olmec, and Aztec. Any area near the Pacific Coast, such as Oaxaca, would have also had caiman available (in Mexico and in Guatemala). But the Classic Maya of the Maya Lowlands knew Crocodylus moreletii and those near the Caribbean would have also known Crocodylus acutus.
The purpose of the lecture is to assist epigraphers, iconographers, zooarchaeologists and archaeologists to see where each genus and each species was available to the Olmec, Maya, and other civilizations of Mesoamerica thousands of years ago. It is understandable that we professors who grew up in the USA think primarily about alligators; and as students we learned about the Nile crocodile and other crocodiles of Africa. So the in-person presentation on July 27, 2023 is to show the actual crocodiles of the Maya lowlands, and the caiman inland from the Pacific Ocean coast.
