Barbed iguanas

Barbed iguanas
Enyalioides rubrigularis , male
Systematics
without rank: Sauropsida Superordinate : Scale lizards (Lepidosauria) Order : Scale reptiles (Squamata) without rank: Toxicofera without rank: Iguana (Iguania) Family : Barbed iguanas
Scientific name
Hoplocercidae
Frost & Etheridge , 1989

The spiny-tailed iguanas ( Hoplocercidae) are a family of iguanas (Iguania) that occurs from Panama to Peru .

features

The lizards reach a head-torso length of 16 centimeters and have characteristic spiked tails. The zygomatic bone (Jugale) and the scaly bone (Squamosum) do not have wide contact with one another. The roof of the parietal bone (parietal) is trapezoidal. The teeth on the upper and lower jaw are pleurodontic, ie in adults they are not attached to the supporting bone. Teeth are absent on the palatine bone , but teeth are present on the wing bone . With the exception of Hoplocercus , the animals can shed their tails at predetermined breaking points in dangerous situations.

Habitat and way of life

The species of the genera Enyalioides and Morunasaurus live in tropical rainforests , Enyalioides in the western Amazon region, Morunasaurus on the Pacific coast from Panama to Ecuador . The nocturnal Hoplocercus spinosus occurs only in the dry forests of the Brazilian Cerrado . All Enyalioides species for which data are available sleep on tree trunks and branches at night. The Hoplocercidae are mainly ground dwellers, some species dig in the ground. They mainly eat termites and locusts , Hoplocercus spinosus also eat beetles.

Systematics

The spiny-tailed iguanas were initially considered a subfamily of the iguanas (Iguanidae) until they were raised to the rank of family by Frost and Etheridge in 1989. There are ten species in three genera:

• Genus Enyalioides
  • Enyalioides altotambo
  • Enyalioides anisolepis
  • Enyalioides azulae
  • Enyalioides binzayedi
  • Enyalioides cofanorum
  • Enyalioides heterolepis
  • Enyalioides laticeps
  • Enyalioides microlepis
  • Enyalioides oshaughnessyi
  • Enyalioides palpebralis
  • Enyalioides praestabilis
  • Enyalioides sophiarothschildae
• Genus Hoplocercus
  • Hoplocercus spinosus
• Genus Morunasaurus
  • Morunasaurus annularis
  • Morunasaurus large

literature

• Eric R. Pianka, Laurie J. Vitt: Lizards. Windows to the Evolution of Diversity (= Organisms and Environments. Vol. 5). University of California Press, Berkeley CA et al. 2003, ISBN 0-520-23401-4 .
• Omar Torres-Carvajal, Pablo J. Venegas and Kevin de Queiroz. 2015. Three New Species of Woodlizards (Hoplocercinae, Enyalioides) from northwestern South America. ZooKeys . 494: 107-132 (2015) doi: 10.3897 / zookeys.494.8903

Web links

Commons : Hoplocercidae  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Hoplocercidae in The Reptile Database