The Common Whiptail Lizard

At the beginning of this month, I had the awesome opportunity to road trip from Tucson, AZ to Houston, TX to look for lizards and see the total eclipse!

This trip was for a documentary about observers. We had a little down time so I was sitting on a camera case doing some sculpting (I’m working on a new concept for a short video series about making art in nature) when a crew member shouted that she had found a lizard. I asked her a few questions: Is it chubby or slender? A really long tail? Pointy face? By her responses I knew we had found a whiptail lizard, the common whiptail lizard, Aspidoscelis gularis!

William L. Farr, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

These lizards are sexually dimorphic meaning the males and females look different. Males often have a orange, red, or pink throat with blue or light blue patches on the sides of their bellies. Females do not have these colors. Their throats and stomachs are more cream colored.

Common whiptail lizards also have a juvenile form. Youngsters tend to have a reddish rump which will fade. And they lack distinct if any spots.

Can you #FindThatLizard?

If so let me know with #FoundThatLizard!