Martinique Curly-tailed Lizard

Martinique Curly-tailed Lizard
Martinique Curly-tailed Lizard
Conservation status
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Family: Leiocephalidae
Genus: Leiocephalus
Species: L. herminieri
Binomial name
Leiocephalus herminieri
(Duméril & Bibron, 1837)

The Martinique Curly-tailed Lizard (Leiocephalus herminieri) is an extinct lizard from the family of curly-tailed lizards (Leiocephalidae). The Latin name commedorates the French naturalist Félix Louis L'Herminier. There are five museum specimens of which three are deposed in Paris, one in London and a further in Leiden. Though Martinique is assumed as range of this species there was some confusion about the type locality in the past. While André Marie Constant Duméril and Gabriel Bibron stated Martinique and Trinidad and Tobago as type locality George Albert Boulenger has given only Trinidad and Tobago as terra typica. Biology, the reasons for its extinction and the date of extinction are unknown. This species was last collected in the 1830s.

Of the three specimens from Paris the largest female is measured with 139 mm and the largest male with 126 mm. The large head scales are more or less distinctly striate. The large dorsal scales are keeled and forming continuous oblique series. The smaller lateral and ventral scales are keeled too. The back is greenish brown with less or more irregular yellowish crossbands. The head is yellowish with four or five black bars on the sides. The venter is yellowish. The throat has oblique black transverse bands.

References

  • Albert Schwartz & Robert W. Henderson: Amphibians and Reptiles of the West Indies: Descriptions, Distributions, and Natural History. University Press of Florida, 1991, ISBN 0813010497

External links

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