Geographical Range: These lizards live in the Sahara Desert, Morocco, and from Mauritania to Egypt.
Habitat: They live in deserts, bushes, and in rock crevices.
Diet in the Wild: Spiny-tailed lizards are mostly herbivorous; however, they sometimes eat insects including crickets, grasshoppers, and ants.
Conservation Status: They are not protected.
Location in the Zoo: They live in the Herpetarium.
The spiny-tailed lizard can have a body length of up to 140 mm with a tail of 145 mm. Juveniles are usually gray with dark spots, while adults are most commonly gray. However, adults can also be red, orange, green and yellow.
To survive in their natural habitat, spiny-tailed lizards use their thick, sharp tail as a weapon. They rarely need to drink as they extract most of their water from their food. Excessive salts are excreted through a salt gland near its eyes.
Spiny-tailed lizards are egg-layers that take several years to reach sexual maturity. Even after they have reached this maturity, they do not reproduce regularly.
Social Organization::
Both males and females are very territorial and solitary.
The Animal at the Zoo:
Unavailable for observations.
Bethany Balzer, bufaloope@hotmail.com
Sources and Links:
Ditman, Raymond L. Reptiles of the World. New York: The Macmillan
Company, 1910.
Reptile1: http://reptile1.websitegalaxy.com/
Tortoisetrust: http://www.tortoisetrust.org/articles/uromastyx.html
Kingsnake: http://www.kingsnake.com/uromastyx/
caresheets/uro-care.htm
Itech: http://itech.pjc.cc.fl.us/jkaplan/zootech/
Course%20Materials/herplec19.htm
