Colorful creature found ‘basking' in sun on uninhabited island. It's a new species
On an uninhabited island off the coast of Australia, a 'smooth' rainforest creature sat in a patch of sunlight. But the 'basking' animal wouldn't be left in peace.
A visiting scientist spotted it – and discovered a new species.
Conrad Hoskin arrived on Scawfell Island, a rugged island off the country's northeastern coast, in 2021, he wrote in a study published Jan. 27 in the peer-reviewed Australian Journal of Taxonomy. He landed with a goal in mind.
'I went to that island in the hopes of finding some interesting reptile species,' Hoskin told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in a 2023 interview about the trip.
During his visit, Hoskin searched the island's rainforests and noticed some unfamiliar-looking lizards, the study said. Intrigued, he caught a few and took them back to the mainland. When he compared the lizards to examples of known species, nothing matched.
Hoskin soon realized he'd discovered a new species: Lampropholis isla, or the Scawfell Island sun skink.
Scawfell Island sun skinks can reach about 4 inches in length, the study said. They have 'robust' bodies with 'almost no narrowing at (the) neck.' Their lower eyelids have a 'transparent' window-like disc. Some adult skinks had 'regrown' tails.
Males and females of the new species vary in coloring, Hoskin said and photos show. Male Scawfell Island sun skinks have 'light brown' bodies with 'bright orange' patches on their sides.
Female skinks also have brown bodies but no colorful patches, the study said and a photo shows.
Hoskin found Scawfell Island sun skinks in rainforest areas with 'granite rocks,' such as several leaf-filled 'gullies.' He also saw the lizards 'basking in sun gaps on the forest floor' and searching for food.
The new species's scientific name is the Spanish word 'isla,' meaning 'island,' after its native environment, the study said. So far, the new species has only been found on Scawfell Island. Hoskin searched nearby islands for the lizard but did not find it.
Scawfell Island is about 30 miles from Mackay, the closest mainland city, and is 'protected within' a national park, the study said.
Previously, Hoskin also discovered a new species of gecko, which he described as a 'little dragon,' on Scawfell Island. 'The presence of two vertebrate endemics (native lizards) on Scawfell Island is exceptional' and 'highlights the conservation significance of this island,' he wrote.
The new species of skink was identified by its DNA, scale pattern, coloring and other subtle physical features, the study said.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Yahoo
Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny champions endangered toad, gives zoo's conservation efforts a boost
CHICAGO — A chatty animated amphibian starring in videos for Bad Bunny's recent album has launched the Puerto Rican crested toad — an endangered species native to the island — into newfound fame, following years of quiet, collaborative conservation efforts involving Chicago's Brookfield Zoo. 'They're kind of famous now,' said Mike Masellis, Brookfield Zoo's lead animal care specialist for aquatics. While getting his oil changed at an auto shop recently, he noticed a kid in the waiting room was wearing a hoodie with an image of the toad. 'It's exciting to see people become aware of the species.' The Puerto Rican reggaeton and rap artist directed a short film in which the crested toad — sapo concho in Spanish — lends an ear to an old man reminiscing about his life on the island and wishing he'd taken more photos. In a stop-motion music video, s apo concho goes clubbing as he pines over what seems to be unrequited love for a female toad; in Spotify the songs play alongside videos of the toad enjoying a cup of coffee, tending to indoor plants, doing yoga and cleaning while listening to music. Behind the scenes at the zoo, the celebrity amphibians have their own room, the species name written on a blue door like it's backstage in a theater. Two pairs of the 30 toads recently bred and laid thousands of eggs in long, stringy, gelatinous sacs that days later morphed into tiny tadpoles. Armed with aquarium nets and a lot of patience, staff counted 1,762 slippery tadpoles, which they then packed in bags of water and oxygen and sent aboard an overnight flight to be released into the Puerto Rican wild just in time for the rainy season. The recent efforts bring the zoo's total to almost 27,000 toads reintroduced to their native habitat since 2012. 'These are the only native toads found in Puerto Rico, but they do have a lot of frogs,' Masellis said. The island is known for the common coquí tree frog, but its various habitats support a diversity of wildlife: 'There's rainforest, and then there's this karst region, almost desert-ish, and that's where these toads are found.' Once thought extinct, the species is classified as globally endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List because of drought from climate change, habitat loss from residential and commercial development and competition from invasive species such as the cane toad, or sapo de caña. Coastline erosion also means wave surges can reach farther inland and bring saltwater into the ponds the toads need to reproduce and lay eggs. The only known wild population resides in the south, mostly within Guánica State Forest, and though no exact count is available, scientists estimate the population might be 2,000 to 3,000. None have been seen in the wild on the northern parts of the island since 1992. When the first Puerto Rican crested toad conservation efforts began in 1980, Brookfield Zoo was one of two U.S. institutions to receive offspring from four breeding individuals at the Puerto Rico Zoological Gardens. 'Releases in a recurring or systematized way with zoos were only standardized in 2006 — it took us a couple of decades,' said Ramón Luis Rivera Lebrón, a technical adviser in the ecology division of the Puerto Rico Department of Natural and Environmental Resources. 'We're at a disadvantage, and that's why zoos have been kind enough to constantly supply us with this new genetic material to maintain (populations).' The species, he said, is extremely secretive, and when tadpoles become toadlets after 25 to 30 days, they take shelter in crevices or under rocks and even burrow underground where they can stay for years to protect themselves from drought and heat. So, for a while, researchers can't be sure how many make it to adulthood. 'The problem is that, until they are sexually mature, which is at 2 years old, they are not prone to visiting ponds formed after rain events,' Rivera Lebrón said. 'So, it is slow. It takes a long time to be able to see an adult individual and document its reproduction.' The agency frees the tadpoles in natural or artificial ponds located in protected areas on public land or private property sometimes owned by conservation nonprofits such as Para la Naturaleza, whose ranch was where the 1,762 tadpoles from Brookfield Zoo were released in mid-May. 'There, we have controlled exposure, forest cover, open areas and shelter,' Rivera Lebrón said. The ranch is one of three areas identified for reintroduction on the island's northern coast, where artificial ponds receive some 15,000 to 20,000 tadpoles annually. Inside the Puerto Rican crested toad room at the zoo, it's a sweltering 80 degrees — just how the amphibians like it for breeding season. After doing their part, males and females are kept in separate aquariums; on top of one tank, the lid is kept in place by a couple of rocks, but staff can't remember whether they had to do that after a daring escape attempt or simply as a preventive measure. The toads are fed crickets, which are full of the nutritional value they need to thrive. 'I see this guy all day,' said Masellis as he held up a male toad, looking into its gold-colored eyes just below the distinctive crest. 'It's a nice life for them.' After Bad Bunny's film premiered, the Puerto Rican Crested Toad Conservancy received increased donations for a new breeding center on the island, according to Rivera Lebrón. The artist's album, he said, has ignited worldwide curiosity for Puerto Rican culture, and the toad has become a point of pride. 'He managed to do what we hadn't been able to: visibilize and viralize the figure of sapo concho,' Rivera Lebrón said. 'We've just taken the opportunity to promote that it's our only Puerto Rican toad, and if we stop recognizing it, we're going to lose it.'
Miami Herald
3 days ago
- Miami Herald
‘Hidden dragon' detected in remote region of Australia for first time in decades
There had not been a confirmed sighting of Ctenophorus aurita, an elusive lizard named the 'hidden dragon,' in decades. Before 2011, only four had ever been seen. Now, thanks to tissue samples from suspected sightings, researchers have confirmed the presence of the 'extremely rare' lizard in one of the world's most remote regions in Australia, according to a June 3 study published in the Australian Journal of Taxonomy. More than 60 individuals were were observed or photographed throughout northwestern Australia's Kimberley region between 2011 and 2023, and their confirmed presence in the new locations more than triples the species' known range, according to researchers. The small hidden dragon, about an inch and a half long, is a master of disguise and utilizes a defense tactic called pebble mimicry, the study said. 'Several individuals were observed running a short distance before crouching and pulling their limbs into their body to expertly mimic a pebble,' researchers said. Because it 'easily eludes detection,' researchers said it is unlikely that the species is 'genuinely rare.' The species is described as having a small, rotund body with a rough texture, a short tail and a small, 'extremely blunt' head. The hidden dragon was first discovered in 1979 when two individuals were found in Wolf Creek Meteor Crater, or Kandimalal, in the eastern Kimberley, according to the study. Five months later, a third specimen was found about 50 miles north. The fourth and final specimen before the species' long hiatus from scientific record was in 1984, about 250 miles northeast from the other three localities, according to the study. Researchers said the hidden dragon is likely not at risk of extinction given it inhabits common ecosystems, such as rocky areas, across a range of about 19,000 square miles of very remote territory. The discovery provides 'significant insight into the distribution and ecology' of the species, and the evolution of Australian dragon lizards more broadly, according to the study. The research team included Melissa Bruton, Jane Melville, Joanna Sumner, Joe Porter, Stephen Mahony and Paul Doughty.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Why three-toed sloths risk their lives to help moths
For centuries, people encountering sloths for the first time have reacted by ridiculing them. In 1526, Spanish conquistador Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés wrote that the sloths he'd seen in the American tropics were 'ugly,' 'useless,' and 'the stupidest animal that can be found in the world.' In 1749, French naturalist Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, called them 'the lowest form of existence' and judged that 'one more defect would have made their lives impossible.' Harsh words about a creature that's survived for at least 50 million years. Yes, sloths have poor hearing and eyesight, and they're slow—the slowest mammal on Earth. But their lethargy is an energy-saving strategy; despite the inability to outrun threats, sloths have figured out what works for them. And while they may appear to be solitary, they don't succeed alone. Sloths operate as one-third of a partnership with moths and algae, which both live in the mammal's thick fur (along with fungi and ticks and mites, oh my). 'Sloths are these fascinating, fantastic, weird mammals that have enlisted really unexpected organisms to help them make their living,' says Jonathan Pauli, a wildlife ecologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison who has studied this symbiosis. After a three-toed sloth has lounged for days in the forest canopy, napping and grazing on poisonous leaves—slowly, so that its liver and four-chambered stomach can break down the toxins—the time comes for its weekly poop. Rather than rain droppings from high up, the animal makes a drawn-out descent. As captured on camera in National Geographic's Underdogs series, the move is exceptionally risky, burning a tenth of the sloth's daily calories and exposing it to predators on the jungle floor, where it's mostly—but not always—helpless to defend itself. More than half of the sloth deaths documented by Pauli's team of researchers in Costa Rica occurred on bathroom breaks. But if a jaguar isn't waiting at the tree's base, a sloth digs a small depression in the soil—a toilet bowl—and relieves itself at last. Cue the moths. Females, including species found only on sloths, lay their eggs in the fresh dung. The eggs become coprophagous larvae, feeding on the feces, and larvae become adult moths that flutter off in search of their own hairy habitats. As many as 120 moths have been counted on a single sloth. Moths fertilize sloth fur with nutrients, like nitrogen, whether by delivering fecal matter there or dying and decomposing. Along with rainwater, nitrogen encourages the growth of algae. And algae give sloths a green coloring—effective camouflage from birds of prey patrolling overhead. The more moths on a sloth, the more nitrogen and algae. Sloths also eat the green stuff as a sort of dietary supplement. Although researchers haven't observed the behavior, Pauli's team tested the contents of sloths' stomachs and found algae. What seems clear to researchers is that sloths, moths, and algae all benefit from their shared arrangement. And now, a team of scientists in Costa Rica is exploring whether the microbiome living on sloths could boost human health, too. Many experts believe sloths are resistant to illness or infection; testing fur samples, the Costa Rican team isolated previously unknown bacteria that may lead to new antibiotics. As concerns mount about superbugs that are capable of defeating existing medications, what if remedies are discovered on the backs and bellies of sloths? An animal maligned in the past as useless and an unlikely survivor would prove to be a hero, sophisticated enough to save human lives. Perhaps we were awfully slow to recognize the sloth's potential. Underdogs will premiere on National Geographic June 15th and stream the next day on Disney+ and Hulu. Please check local listings.
