Apr 16 2012

Mary’s Monday Metazoan: That must have been some flex

Categories:

Organisms

by PZ Myers

(via NatGeo)

(Also on Sb)

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27 comments

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1

Marcus Ranum

16 April 2012 at 9:05 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

You wouldn’t LIKE ME when I’m ANGRY.
2

leighshryock

16 April 2012 at 9:41 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I know this is just anthropomorphization, but, he sure does look snug there, doesn’t he?
3

leighshryock

16 April 2012 at 9:42 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Smug, not snug.
4

Glen Davidson

16 April 2012 at 9:48 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Snug before, smug now–or possibly just relieved.

Glen Davidson
5

Trebuchet

16 April 2012 at 9:59 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I kept expecting him to sell me insurance.
6

grumpypathdoc

16 April 2012 at 10:53 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

He’s just saying:”Boy was that was itchy. Now what a relief.”
7

Area Man

16 April 2012 at 11:03 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I love brown anoles. They used to be everywhere where I lived; they’re incredibly fun to watch and occasionally catch. If only they were 12 feet long with a saddle on their backs…
8

Brownian

16 April 2012 at 11:09 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I love brown anoles.

Me too. Which is probably why I’m always so surprised to hear about the popularity of anal bleaching creams and treatments. Don’t give in to the beauty myth, people!
9

reasonbeing

16 April 2012 at 11:11 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Very cool. I am so itchy I wish I could shed some skin in that fashion!
10

rowanvt

16 April 2012 at 11:25 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@7-

Actually, that’s a green anole, not a brown. The browns have a stronger dorsal pattern than the greens.

I had a pair of these as a teenager. I miss my little anoles. I even hand fed the female for 3 months after she went blind.
11

Scarina

16 April 2012 at 11:27 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

It’s nude!
12

Area Man

16 April 2012 at 11:32 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

“Actually, that’s a green anole, not a brown. The browns have a stronger dorsal pattern than the greens.”

The word “brown anole” has long been used to refer to both species. That’s the problem with common names.
13

rowanvt

16 April 2012 at 11:40 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Hunh. I’ve only ever heard ‘anole’ as the common name, and brown, green, cuban brown, cuban green added to distinguish the species.
14

René

16 April 2012 at 1:39 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Is it a nole it doesn’t have, or an ole? In either case, what is it it doesn’t have?
15

Part-Time Insomniac, Zombie Porcupine Nox Arcana Fan

16 April 2012 at 4:52 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

How cute!
16

adamreith

16 April 2012 at 5:15 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Love these little guys. They are legion around my house, flaunting their throat patches and trying to evade the jaws of the local Black Racer.

http://www.generalexotics.com/images/blackracersnake.jpg
17

evader

16 April 2012 at 5:16 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

So glad humans don’t do that!
18

a3kr0n

16 April 2012 at 5:46 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I suppose making any reference to the Incredible Hulk would be too banal, which is why nobody has yet, until now…
19

Ermine

16 April 2012 at 6:27 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Back in the ’70s, when I was 7 years old and living in Irving, Tx., I used to order green anoles from the back of Boy’s Life magazine. “Free Chameleon if you buy 100 Mealworms!” Send them a dollar, and they’d send you a live lizard in the mail. At 7, I thought that was the most fantastic idea in the world, and I worked HARD to make that dollar to buy one!

In the end I think I managed to afford 3 all told over the course of a couple of years. I’d keep them in a terrarium tank while I got them used to handling, then release them in our house, where they’d live in the macrame tassels of the hanging flowerpots and do away with far more flies and roaches than the exterminators ever managed. (We lived in a very cheap apartment complex at that time.. Ugh!) Every day or two I’d check all the tassels til I found the lizard, then put it on my shirt where it’d cling unmoving while I wandered the complex looking for bugs to hand-feed it.

I have got to say that they were fantastic pets for a critter-loving lad like me! How much did I love that sort of creepy critter? Well, my mother called me “Little Arliss” for much of my childhood, for those of you who’ve read Ol’ Yeller and will understand the reference.. ;) I did have to start turning out all my pants pockets before every laundry load after the episode with the frogs and the wringer washer some years later – (They were for my pet snapping turtle!)..

Ahh, memories!
20

Marcus Ranum

16 April 2012 at 7:10 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@a3kron: I suppose making any reference to the Incredible Hulk would be too banal, which is why nobody has yet, until now…

That was comment #1. Maybe I was too subtle.
21

spamamander, hellmart survivor

16 April 2012 at 9:21 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Hmm, “Brown”ian. Say no more.
22

autumn

16 April 2012 at 11:09 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

When I was a kid there was a period of intense lizard-catching among my circle of friends. Although the skinks were considered the most prized catches, the anoles were fun because we could make them bite our earlobes and dangle there.
23

gekkogecko

17 April 2012 at 12:04 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I first saw these when i was very young. They may be the main reason I took an interest in herpetology. Although I haven’t kept any in years. currently just have tokay geckos, crested geckos and an old blue tongue skink.

These are more like little iguanas and certainly not geckos or chameleons. The green anole’s only real risk is competition from invasive species.

Interesting, but not surprising, these are bred as feeders for some snakes.
24

Ermine

17 April 2012 at 12:38 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Oh yes GG, I know that anoles aren’t chameleons, ore even closely related to them. I knew that even back when I was buying them from Boy’s Life magazine, but THEY advertised them as ‘Chameleons’. Even at 7 I knew the difference between an anole and a chameleon.

Kids are smart, especially about the things that interest them most!
25

Mal Adapted

17 April 2012 at 7:50 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

My mom, who died Saturday, used to catch spiders to feed my anoles. What a mom!
26

Ogvorbis: Insert Appropriate Appelation Here

17 April 2012 at 7:59 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I get to see them when I visit the inlaws down in Florida. They are everywhere. And fun to watch.

I guess I was depraved as a kid. All we had were horned lizards and ring-neck lizards and chukkawallas.
27

Ogvorbis: Insert Appropriate Appelation Here

17 April 2012 at 8:04 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Er, ‘depraved’ was actually an attempt at ‘deprived’.