Wednesday, July 6, 2016 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Tales from a
Sisters
Naturalist
by Jim Anderson
The many faces of
the alligator lizard
That alligator lizard in the
picture was serious about liv-
ing up to its name. It and my
son Caleb’s finger met while
we were exploring the Lava
Beds National Monument
back in the 1980s.
They had come upon
each other while my wife,
Sue, and the rest of our kids
were pursuing and tagging
monarch butterflies on the
northern part of the monu-
ment. It did eventually spit
out Caleb’s finger, but little
did we know how aggressive
that beautiful, ambitious liz-
ard could be.
The alligator lizard clan
was first classified in the
1830s by Arend Friedrich
August Wiegmann, a German
zoologist and herpetologist (a
person who studies lizards,
snakes, and amphibians). In
1835, he founded, together
with other scholars, the zoo-
logical periodical known as
Wiegmann’s Archive.
Wiegmann specialized
in classifying Mexican fish
and herps, and in 1834 he
published Herpetologia
Mexicana, a monograph
on the reptiles of Mexico.
One of his discoveries
from his Mexican travels,
Weigman’s Alligator Lizard,
Gerrhonotus liocephalus is
still on the books the way he
described it.
But all the other alligator
lizards found in the western
U.S. have been renamed and
reclassified for their coloring,
habitat, geographic locations,
and other traits.
According to Al St.
John’s Lone Pine field guide,
Reptiles of The Northwest,
he’s listed the Oregon alli-
gator lizard, the California
alligator lizard and a bunch
.
.
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of others running around in
California as separate species,
such as the San Francisco,
Sierra, Northwestern, Shasta,
and five or six species of alli-
gator lizards in Canada.
While naming them is
difficult, the diet of the alli-
gator lizard is simple: what-
ever will fit into its mouth.
That can be other, smaller
lizards and snakes which are
devoured as soon as they’re
spotted. A nice fat and juicy
scarab beetle will vanish
down the lizard’s gullet in the
blink of an eye.
If the alligator lizard’s an
occupant of your kitchen gar-
den you will never need to
apply any pesticides; cabbage
looper caterpillars will be
gobbled up; along with flea
beetles; corn borer caterpil-
lars; squash bugs; cutworm
larvae; and other plant pests.
Alligator lizards are
almost fearless when it
comes to prey; mice and
even a juvenile gopher will
be grabbed and swallowed.
But then there’s that old
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19
photo by Jim anderson
An alligator lizard trying to live up to it’s name.
adage, “He who lives by the
sword…” Alligator lizards
are often caught and eaten
by the American kestrel,
who also feeds it/them to the
babies. Gopher snakes, whip
snakes and the like will not
hesitate to take an alligator
lizard for a snack.
The most surprising loca-
tion I found alligator lizards
was on the coast, around
OMSI’s Camp Arago near
North Bend, where I sup-
pose some hair-splitter has
named them the Coastal or
Cape Arago alligator liz-
ard. They love hunting for
prey behind the dunes where
OMSI students watched them
devouring beetles and other
inhabitants of the sandy soils.
We watched one who was
agile enough to hang onto
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