Corytophanidae
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Smith & Brodie , 1982 |
The Corytophanidae are a family of iguanas (Iguania), which are distributed from central Mexico to central and northwestern South America . They are slim and long-legged, small to medium-sized lizards. They reach head-trunk lengths of nine to twenty centimeters. In the helmet iguanas and crowned basilisks , both sexes have large ridges of skin on the head, in the basilisk only the larger males. Helmet and frontal lobe basilisk also have ridges on their back and tail. The skin combs are stretched out during imposing and courtship and visually enlarge the animals.
Basilisks have enlarged scales on the sides of their toes, so they can run across watercourses very quickly when fleeing.
Apomorphies that distinguish the Corytophanidae from other iguanas include a Y-shaped parietal bone (not in Laemanctus ) and special vertebrae in the caudal spine.
Way of life
The Corytophanidae live in rain and dry forests, helmet iguanas and crowned basilisks on trees, basilisks more on the ground, often near watercourses.
All Corytophanidae feed on insects and other smaller animals and reproduce, except for the ovoviviparous Corytophanes percarinata , oviparous .
Systematics
The Corytophanidae were initially considered a subfamily of the iguanas (Iguanidae) until they were raised to the rank of a family by Frost and Etheridge in 1989. The purely arboreal (tree-dwelling) genera Corytophanes and Laemanctus together form a previously unnamed clade .
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Corytophanidae Fitzinger, 1843
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Basilisk ( basiliscus )
- Helmbasilisk ( Basiliscus basiliscus (Linnaeus, 1758))
- Ecuador basilisk ( Basiliscus galeritus Duméril, 1851)
- Frontal lobe basilisk ( Basiliscus plumifrons Cope, 1876)
- Striped basilisk ( Basiliscus vittatus Wiegmann, 1828)
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Corytophaninae
- † Geiseltaliellus Kuhn, 1944
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Helm iguanas ( Corytophanes )
- Corytophanes cristatus (Merrem, 1821)
- Corytophanes hernandesii (Wiegmann, 1831)
- Corytophanes percarinatus Duméril, 1856
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Crowned Basilisk ( Laemanctus )
- Laemanctus longipes Wiegmann, 1834
- Laemanctus serratus Cope, 1864
- † Babibasiliscus Conrad, 2015
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Basilisk ( basiliscus )
Tribal history
Geiseltaliellus and Babibasiliscus are among the earliest representatives of the Corytophanidae . The former is known from the Geiseltal and the Messel pit , both in Germany, and is documented by several skeletal finds, some of which are complete, suggesting an animal that is 20 to 30 cm long. The genus is partly assigned to the iguanas . The age of the two sites is 47 to 43 million years, which corresponds to the Middle Eocene . The latter could be described in 2015 using a complete skull and the first two cervical vertebrae from the Bridger Formation in the US state of Wyoming . Its age is dated to 48 million years, it is closely related to the crown basilisks. While the family is common today in Central and South America, it may have originated further north in North America or Eurasia. In the Middle Eocene, North America was around 9 ° C warmer than today on average, which advocated dense tropical to subtropical forests.
Individual evidence
- ^ Krister T. Smith: Eocene Lizards of the Clade Geiseltaliellus from Messel and Geiseltal, Germany, and the Early Radiation of Iguanidae (Reptilia: Squamata). Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History 50 (2), 2009, pp. 219-306
- ↑ Jack L. Conrad: A New Eocene Casquehead Lizard (Reptilia, Corytophanidae) from North America. PlosOne 10 (7), 2015, p. E0127900 doi : 10.1371 / journal.pone.0127900
Web links
- Corytophanidae in The Reptile Database
- Animal Diversity Web Family Corytophanidae
- Integrated Taxonomic Information System Corytophanidae