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Spatial organization of the home ranges of males (fine line) and females (bold line) of Tropidurus hispidus in an anthropogenic area in northeastern Brazil. Scale bar = 5 metres.
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Citations
... Cannibalism is known in T. hispidus Sales et al. 2011), and since the species is intensely territorial (Eloi and Leite-Filho 2013;Melo et al. 2017), conspecific tails, especially in the stomachs of adult males, could result from either territoriality or opportunism (Sales et al. 2011;Passos et al. 2013;Melo et al. 2017). In this case, however, the small size of the juvenile T. hispidus is indicative of true cannibalism. ...
... Cannibalism is known in T. hispidus Sales et al. 2011), and since the species is intensely territorial (Eloi and Leite-Filho 2013;Melo et al. 2017), conspecific tails, especially in the stomachs of adult males, could result from either territoriality or opportunism (Sales et al. 2011;Passos et al. 2013;Melo et al. 2017). In this case, however, the small size of the juvenile T. hispidus is indicative of true cannibalism. ...
Here we describe new squamete reptile itens in the diet of Tropidurus hispidus.
... The home range size of O. cyclurus is much smaller than the terrestrial leopard lizards Gambelia sila and G. wislizenii, in which home range can cover areas of multiple hectares [42,43], or other terrestrial iguanian lizards of comparable size (e.g., Crotaphytus reticulatus [44]). Conversely, our estimates largely overlap with other saxicolous (e.g., Tropidurus hispidus [45]) or arboreal species (e.g., Sceloporus undulatus [46]), including the sister species O. cuvieri [47] where males' home ranges are on average 1315 m 2 [48]. However, the possible influence of individual sex on home range size [41] was not assessed in our study, leaving the potential of a skewed estimated average home range size open. ...
Simple Summary
The spiny-tailed lizard Oplurus cyclurus is a widespread endemic iguanian occurring in southern and western Madagascar dry areas. This species is mostly arboreal, and little is known about its spatial ecology. We conducted a radio tracking study on 19 individuals of a population with saxicolous habits, inhabiting an open, treeless savannah in the Isalo sandstone massif (central-southern Madagascar). Tracked lizards had a small home range size (95% isopleth = 247.8 m²) and showed high site and burrow fidelity. The activity pattern was unimodal, increasing along the day and with juveniles more active than adults in unfavourable weather conditions. Basking occurred mostly near the burrow entrance. Despite high burrow fidelity, lizards changed shelters regularly (approx. once a week), but there was no obvious relation between lizards’ body and/or tail size and the width and depth of selected burrows. We argue that the saxicolous habits of this population may entail local behavioural adaptations.
Abstract
Understanding the spatial ecology of species has important implications for conservation, as it helps identify suitable habitats and minimum requirements for biodiversity monitoring and management. The spiny-tailed lizard Oplurus cyclurus is a widespread endemic iguanid occurring in dry areas of southern and western Madagascar. While the species is known to be mostly arboreal, populations of the Isalo sandstone massif suggest local adaptation to a less forested savannah and a more exposed habitat. We radio-tracked 19 spiny-tailed lizards to investigate the species’ rock-dwelling behaviour and spatial ecology at Isalo National Park. Tracked individuals showed high site and burrow fidelity, and a basking behaviour mostly tied to the accessibility of their burrow, the time of day, and their life stage. Activity peaked during the sunniest hours, while juveniles were more active than adults with unfavourable weather conditions. Despite high burrow fidelity, lizards used shelters non-exclusively, regularly changing (approx. once a week) with neighbouring burrows (average distance between burrows = 13.6 m). However, there was no obvious relation between lizards’ body and/or tail size and the width and depth of selected burrows. Dynamic Brownian Bridge Movement Models estimated frequented areas over 247.8 m² (95% isopleth), where territorial overlap is common. Our results challenge the notion that burrow-site fidelity is the sole driving factor behind space utilization in the studied population. We argue that the apparently unusual saxicolous habits imposed by habitat features (the absence of trees) may lead to local behavioural adjustments influencing antipredatory and foraging strategies, as well as intraspecific interactions.
... Based on the lack of nestedness of frugivory interactions we can infer that cacti-frugivore interactions are less asymmetric than other plant-frugivore networks (Almeida & Mikich, 2017;Bascompte et al., 2003). The high modularity of the frugivory interactions also (Melo et al., 2017), while L. klugei ...
Cacti fruits are key resources to many frugivorous animals in Neotropical arid and semiarid regions. However, most studies have focused on a particular animal group or cacti species, but few have explored the overall interactions of such species at the community level. Here we monitored frugivory on five cacti species using camera traps that sampled diurnal and nocturnal interactions. We investigated the structure of interactions with bird, mammal, and reptile frugivores in the Brazilian Caatinga dry forest. We hypothesized that the height of cacti limit interactions with different types of frugivores, which would result in highly structured and modular interaction networks. In 2929 camera-days, we recorded 23 vertebrate species feeding on cacti fruits, including seven new records, all determined to be primary seed dispersers. As predicted, the cacti-frugivore network was modular and non-nested, with the two shortest cacti species grouped in a module dominated by interactions with reptiles and non-flying mammals. The tallest cacti species were dominated by frugivory interactions with birds and had comparatively less interaction diversity than shorter cacti species. Our results support the contention that cacti are keystone species in semiarid ecosystems where they produce small-seeded fleshy fruits year-round.
... This pattern occurs in other lizard species and has been attributed to differences in reproductive stage and investment (French et al., , 2008. For instance, the territories of Tropidurus males encompass several females' territories, leading to frequent male-male contests and more movement in open areas, thus exposing males to increased predation risks Kohlsdorf et al., 2006;Melo et al., 2017;Pinto et al., 2005;Wiederhecker et al., 2003). ...
Wildfires cause significant changes in natural habitats and can impact lizard populations. Through changes in the thermal environment, reduced prey availability, and increased exposure to parasite vectors, wildfires affect lizard physiology, immunity, and health. We sampled 56 Tropidurus oreadicus lizards from Cerrado savannas of Brazil living in two adjacent sites: one burned 14 days before the study, and the other unburned for 6 years. We logged the air temperatures of those sites throughout fieldwork. We assessed the short-term possible homeostatic imbalances caused by the fires via measuring body mass, circulating levels of corticosterone (CORT), leukocytes profile changes in heterophile-lymphocyte ratios (HLRs), innate immunity using the bacterial killing assay (BKA), and the diagnosis of hemoparasites using molecular techniques. The air temperature was significantly higher in the burned site. There was no difference in lizard body mass between the two sites, suggesting that prey availability was not affected by the wildfire. While parasite presence was seemingly not affected by fire, the timing of initial parasite infection for animals in the study was unknown, so we also evaluated parasitism as an independent variable relative to the other metrics. Our results showed that parasitic infections lead to reduced bactericidal capacity and body mass in lizards, suggesting clinical disease and depletion of innate immune resources. Moreover, we observed increased HLR with fire and parasitic infections and a strong negative correlation with BKA. These findings suggest that the increased environmental temperature following wildfires may lead to increased CORT and decreased BKA.
... Each grid was delimited using spray paint, and a marking was made every 2 m to provide a more accurate location of the individuals. Within these grids, we observed only marked lizards and recorded their positions according to a Cartesian axis system (one for each quadrant), in which the 'Y' axis was the distance (in m) from the original position of the lizard to the initial line (quadrant width) and the 'X' axis was the distance to the established 'zero' (Van Sluys 1997;Rocha 1999;Stark et al. 2005;Melo et al. 2017). Each grid was visited daily by the same observer three times in the morning and three times in the afternoon. ...
Displacement occurs during the movement of an organism and can be defined as a change in spatial position, being influenced by biotic and abiotic factors. Measuring the displacement of organ- isms within their home range is relevant for understanding their use of space and can reveal possible causes and consequences of their movements. During part of the dry season in a semi-arid region of Northeastern Brazil, we marked and observed syntopic Tropidurus hispidus and Tropidurus semitaeniatus individuals in a rocky habitat, and compared their locomotive parameters. We also evaluated the existence of relationships between locomotion and morphometry (snout–vent length and body mass) and abiotic factors (air temperature and relative humidity) of these species. A total of 25.33 hours of observations showed that T. semitaeniatus is clearly less sedentary in relation to T. hispidus, in terms of short- term movements. There was a tendency of smaller individuals to perform a greater number of displacement movements per min- ute, and displacement distance per minute increased in accor- dance with an increase in relative humidity for T. semitaeniatus. The movement pattern of the less sedentary T. semitaeniatus may reflect their greater dependence on rocky outcrops and, consequently, they demonstrate better morphological and behavioural adaptations. The surface area–volume relationship, which influences thermoregulatory behaviour, may explain the relationship between morphology and displacement distance in T. semitaeniatus. Furthermore, this species appears to control their movements with the aim of avoiding dehydration caused by restrictions of relative low humidity in their microhabitats. This study has important implications for future research on biomechanics, ecophysiology and modelling of the potential distribution of Tropiduridae lizards under climate change.
... p < 0.001, from our data). Male iguanid lizards are thought to use larger home ranges to maximize their reproductive success by increasing the spatial overlap with females' home ranges, leading to the formation of harems in such polygynous systems as seen with Liolaemus lutzae Mertens, 1938, by Rocha (1999); Tropidurus itambere Rodrigues, 1987, by Van Sluys (1997; and Tropidurus hispidus Spix, 1825, by Melo et al. (2017). Our results showed that male T. montanus can associate with up to three females, a harem size similar to that of other polyg-ynous lizard species (Haenel et al. 2003), with home-range areas positively correlated with harem size for the species. ...
In many species, the shape, size, and location of home ranges depend on the spatial positioning of resources. Therefore, evaluating the resources and conditions related to the space use of individuals can provide crucial information on the species’ ecology and sociobiology. In this study, we evaluated factors shaping the use of space by the lizard Tropidurus montanus M.T. Rodrigues, 1987 and assessed how the distribution of resources can affect the size of the home range and how the quality of the male's home range can influence the number of associated females. We hypothesized that (i) males with a larger body size would have a higher-quality home range, and (ii) there would be a positive relationship between the home-range size and home-range quality of males and the number of associated females. Our results suggest that males, females, and juveniles adopt different strategies. While females and juveniles have relatively small home ranges located in more suitable locations, males invest in larger home ranges, including in lower-quality habitat patches. Our results suggest that males increase their home ranges to incorporate resources females prefer, enlarging the number of females in their harems.
... This is a heliophilic and insectivorous lizard (Vitt et al., 1996) that adopts a sit-and-wait foraging strategy (Schoener, 1971) and exhibits territorial behaviors . This species has been the subject of several studies, that have addressed aspects of its ecology and natural history (Rodrigues, 1988;Vitt et al., 1996;Teixeira and Giovanelli, 1999;Kolodiuk et al., 2009;Kolodiuk et al., 2010;Ribeiro et al., 2010;Ribeiro and Freire, 2011;Santana et al., 2011;Gomes et al., 2015;Melo et al., 2017;Albuquerque et al., 2018), cytogenetics (Kasahara et al., 1987;Frost et al., 2001;Matos et al., 2016) and parasitism (Almeida et al., 2008;Delfino et al., 2011;Brito et al., 2014), although relatively well studied, there are still many aspects of the natural history of this species that remain unknown, especially behavioral aspects related to territoriality, reproduction and predation on vertebrates. Diet-related data can be easily obtained in the laboratory, however, information on behavioral traits is more difficult to observe in captivity, as even in natural environments aggressive encounters and predation events are rarely reported (Passos et al., 2016). ...
Siphonops annulatus (Mikan, 1822) is a neotropical caecilian widely distributed in the Amazon and Atlantic Forests. It is among the best studied caecilians in the Neotropical region, but many aspects of its natural history remain poorly known. Here we report an exceptionally large individual of S. annulatus from Rondonia, Brazil. At 720 mm total length, this specimen is much larger than the previously largest reported for the species at 539 mm.
... This species has been the subject of several studies, that have addressed aspects of its ecology and natural history (Rodrigues, 1988;Vitt et al., 1996;Teixeira and Giovanelli, 1999;Kolodiuk et al., 2009;Kolodiuk et al., 2010;Ribeiro et al., 2010;Ribeiro and Freire, 2011;Santana et al., 2011;Santana et al., 2014;Gomes et al., 2015;Lima et al., 2017;Melo et al., 2017;Albuquerque et al., 2018), cytogenetics (Kasahara et al., 1987;Frost et al., 2001;Matos et al., 2016) and parasitism (Almeida et al., 2008;Delfino et al., 2011;Brito et al., 2014), although relatively well studied, there are still many aspects of the natural history of this species that remain unknown, especially behavioral aspects related to territoriality, reproduction and predation on vertebrates. Diet-related data can be easily obtained in the laboratory, however, information on behavioral traits is more difficult to observe in captivity, as even in natural environments aggressive encounters and predation events are rarely reported (Passos et al., 2016). ...
In this study, we report additional cannibalism and predation events in Tropidurus hispidus
and, by reviewing our data with that found in the literature, we quantify the relative importance of vertebrate categories as prey for T. hispidus. In addition, we provide an ethogram for events related to territoriality, courting and copulation.
... The genus Tropidurus is also ideal to evaluate the extensiveness of Evo-Devo inferences derived from studies in Anolis ecomorphs (e.g. Feiner, 2016;Sanger et al., 2012) due to the following features: (1) large clutch sizes (3-10 eggs; Arruda et al., 2019;Delssin et al., 2019); (2) widespread distribution in South America (Carvalho, 2013;Frost et al., 2001;Rodrigues, 1987); (3) strong territoriality that enables tracking the same individuals for several weeks (Kohlsdorf et al., 2006;Rodrigues & Kohlsdorf, 2019); (4) social structure in harems, with several (gravid) females associated to the same territory (Melo et al., 2017); (5) easy capture by lasso and relatively simple maintenance in the lab (Delssin et al., 2019;Py-Daniel et al., 2017;Van Sluys, 1993). Finally, phylogenetic relationships have been addressed intensely in this family Carvalho et al., 2018;Carvalho et al., 2020;Carvalho, 2016;Domingos et al., 2017;Matos et al., 2016;Teixeira et al., 2016;Werneck et al., 2015), which allow evolutionary inferences from comparative studies. ...
Studies in Evo-Devo benefit from the use of a variety of organisms, as comparative approaches provide a better understanding of Biodiversity and Evolution. Standardized protocols to incubate eggs and manipulate embryo development enable postulation of additional species as suitable biological systems for research in the field. In the past decades, vertebrate lineages such as Squamata (lizards, snakes, and amphisbaenians) emerged as crucial study systems for addressing topics as diverse as phenotypic evolution and climate change. However, protocols for maintaining gravid females and incubating eggs in the lab under experimental conditions are available to only a few squamate species. This resource article presents a simple incubation guide that standardizes conditions to maintain embryos of Tropidurus catalanensis (Squamata: Tropiduridae) under different experimental conditions, manipulating relevant environmental factors like temperature and humidity. We identified associated effects relating the egg incubation condition to developmental stage, incubation time, hatching success, and resulting morphotypes. Temperature and humidity play a key role in development and require attention when establishing the experimental design. Current literature comprises information for Tropidurus lizards that ponders how general in Squamata are the ecomorphs originally described for Anolis. Studies evaluating phenotypic effects of developmental environments suggest plasticity in some of the traits that characterize the ecomorphological associations described for this family. We expect that this incubation guide encourages future studies using Tropidurus lizards to address Evo-Devo questions.
RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS
We provide a guide to incubate embryos of Tropidurus lizards under different experimental conditions, accessing the effects of developmental environments on hatching success, developmental rates, and neonate phenotypes.
... Based on these preliminary results that are in agreement with some species of mid-sized animals found in the area, the connectivity distances used to analyze the dense Caatinga were set at 100, 560, 1140 and 20,000 m (see Section 3.3). These (100-1140 m) cover a wide range of different species' responses to landscape patterning [64][65][66], including the following: Tropidurus hispidus, which is a reptile that can travel distances between patches nearly 100 m apart [67]; Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris, which is a mammal that has been reported to travel distances of approximately 500 m [68]; and Procyon cancrivorus, which is a mammal that can travel distances around 1900 m [69]. The 20,000 m distance was chosen to assess the landscape perception by Herpailurus yagouaroundi, a feline that travels long distances and is one of the most dispersive terrestrial animals found in the study area [70], inhabiting several areas of the Caatinga biome [71,72]; it has been reported in the fragmented forest in the state of São Paulo [64]. ...
... Decreases in connectivity in response to agricultural expansion were assumed to be smaller for species with shorter dispersal distances, which were based on the published literature, and our findings found reductions in connectivity for these species to be between approximately 2% and 6% ( Figure 6). These decreases in connectivity may have negative consequences for T. hispidus due to its low dispersal capacity [67]. Defining priority native vegetation patches for conservation and restoration, using the dispersal distance of H. yagouaroundi as a reference, could potentially provide protection for other coexisting species, as we expect H. yagouaroundii's requirements to be the largest [87]. ...
Land-use and land-cover (LULC) changes are major drivers of biodiversity loss in semi-arid regions, such as the Caatinga biome located in the Northeast of Brazil. We investigated landscape dynamics and fragmentation in an area of the São Francisco Valley in the Brazilian Caatinga biome and measured the effect of these dynamics on ecological, functional and structural connectivity over a 33-year period (1985–2018). We calculated landscape connectivity indices based on graph theory to quantify the effect of further agricultural expansion on ecological connectivity at the landscape scale. We used a multicriteria decision analysis that integrates graph-based connectivity indices at the habitat patch scale, combined with an index of human disturbance to identify patches that, if conserved and restored, preserve the connectivity of the landscape most effectively. In the period studied, agriculture increased at a rate of 2104 ha/year, while native Caatinga vegetation decreased at a rate of 5203 ha/year. Both dense and open Caatinga became more fragmented, with the number of fragments increasing by 85.2% and 28.6%, respectively, whilst the average fragment size decreased by 84.8% and 6.1% for dense and open Caatinga, respectively. If agriculture patches were to expand by a 300 m buffer around each patch, the overall ecological connectivity could be reduced by 6–15%, depending on the species’ (small- to mid-size terrestrial vertebrates) mobility characteristics for which the connectivity indices were calculated. We provided explicit spatial connectivity and fragmentation information for the conservation and restoration of the Caatinga vegetation in the studied area. This information helps with conservation planning in this rapidly changing ecosystem.
