Object Details
- Creator
- Günther, Albert
- Book Title
- Biologia Centrali-Americana. Reptilia and Batrachia.
- Caption
- Heloderma Horridum.
- Educational Notes
- These lizards may look harmless. But, keep your guard up because the Mexican Beaded Lizard is one of few known types of lizards to be venomous. When a Mexican Beaded Lizard bites into its prey, it delivers a nerve poison. They dont have fangs like a venomous snake, though. Instead, these lizards have grooves on their teeth that funnel the poison from their glands to their prey. The Mexican Beaded Lizard eats many kinds of animals, including baby rabbits, rodents, birds, lizards, frogs, and insects. It catches most of its prey on the ground, but if necessary, it will climb a tree or dig in the dirt for food. From this picture, you can see why its called a beaded lizard. Each of its scales has a tiny bump making the lizards skin look like its made of beads. Something else that is special about this lizard is how it stores fat. Like a camel, it stores lots of fat in one placenot in a hump like a camel doesbut in its tail. Because of this, their tails can get pretty big. This is a good adaptation to have, especially if one of these carnivorous lizards is on the lazier side. If it doesnt like to spend a lot of time hunting, the lizard will still survive off the stored fat if needed.
- The image shows a top, bottom, and side view of a beaded lizard.
- Publication Date
- 1885-1902
- Image ID
- SIL-bca_04_00_00_376
- Catalog ID
- 742627
- Rights
- No Copyright - United States
- Type
- Prints
- Publication Place
- London
- Publisher
- R. H. Porter
- See more items in
- See Wonder
- Taxonomy
- Heloderma horridum
- Smithsonian Libraries
- Topic
- Reptiles
- Lizards
- Language
- English
- Latin
- Record ID
- silgoi_66640
