Monday, October 17, 2011

The gecko in my bathroom and other lizards of East Africa

I love this little lizard. It eats bugs and poses no harm to anything else.

I like all types of wildlife. I see lizards from time to time as I am birding or as they wander into our house. I don't plan to provide much text... just enjoy the lizards!

Tropical house gecko (Hemidactylus mabouia) at Agahozo-Shalom
Youth Village, Rwanda

Usambara two-horned chameleon (Chamaeleo fischeri) in the West
Usambara Mountains, Tanzania

A young Usambara two-horned chameleon that I picked up from the
middle of the road and put into the vegetation.

A species of chameleon in dry country outside of Tarangire National Park,
Tanzania.

Water monitor (Varanus niloticus) in Murchison Falls National Park,
Uganda

Striped skink (Trachylepis striata) at Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village,
Rwanda. It is funny that this picture is actually out in the nature park at
ASYV because I see these skinks everywhere. They live just off the
pathway that leads away from my house and they are everywhere,
even venturing inside to eat bugs.

Mwanza rock agama (Agama mwanzae) in Serengeti National Park,
Tanzania. The female is actually duller brown, again a form of sexual
dimorphism
.

Red-headed agama (Agama agama) in Murchison Falls National Park,
Uganda.

I think this is a Tree agama (Acanthocercus atricollis), but I do not have
a more definitive field guide nor did I get a look at whether it has a
dimpled occipital scale on the crown of its head or not. Call me a bad
lizard-watcher, but I have no idea what that is or how I would know
if I saw it. Herpetologists, help!

Basking is a behavior of reptiles to warm themselves up in the sun.


How can you not love lizards? For sharp, scaly little critters, they sure
are cute.

1 comment:

  1. Good morning how are you?

    My name is Emilio, I am a Spanish boy and I live in a town near to Madrid. I am a very interested person in knowing things so different as the culture, the way of life of the inhabitants of our planet, the fauna, the flora, and the landscapes of all the countries of the world etc. in summary, I am a person that enjoys traveling, learning and respecting people's diversity from all over the world.

    I would love to travel and meet in person all the aspects above mentioned, but unfortunately as this is very expensive and my purchasing power is quite small, so I devised a way to travel with the imagination in every corner of our planet. A few years ago I started a collection of letters addressed to me in which my goal was to get at least 1 letter from each country in the world. This modest goal is feasible to reach in the most part of countries, but unfortunately it’s impossible to achieve in other various territories for several reasons, either because they are countries at war, either because they are countries with extreme poverty or because for whatever reason the postal system is not functioning properly.

    For all this I would ask you one small favour:
    Would you be so kind as to send me a letter by traditional mail from Rwanda? I understand perfectly that you think that your blog is not the appropriate place to ask this, and even, is very probably that you ignore my letter, but I would call your attention to the difficulty involved in getting a letter from that country, and also I don’t know anyone neither where to write in Rwanda in order to complete my collection. a letter for me is like a little souvenir, like if I have had visited that territory with my imagination and at same time, the arrival of the letters from a country is a sign of peace and normality and a original way to promote a country in the world. My postal address is the following one:

    Emilio Fernandez Esteban
    Avenida Juan de la Cierva, 44
    28902 Getafe (Madrid)
    Spain

    If you wish, you can visit my blog www.cartasenmibuzon.blogspot.com, where you can see the pictures of all the letters that I have received from whole World.

    Finally I would like to thank the attention given to this letter, and whether you can help me or not, I send my best wishes for peace, health and happiness for you, your family and all your dear beings.

    Yours Sincerely

    ReplyDelete