Insects, Plants, Fungi and Animals

Our Lizards

May 25, 2020 /

The lizards here outdo those in Estero, in variety, color and amusing behavior. Almost all we ever saw before the move was the abundant and invasive brown anole and rarely the native green anole. Here we have a healthy population of green anole along with several others we had not seen before, but the hilarious Eastern fence lizard male doing competitive push-ups in his deep blue-bellied mating phase coloration to impress the nearby female took first prize by me. These fearless little pit bulls keep us company during morning coffee on the porch, though I suspect bug meals has more to do with it than being social. I was able to reach out and briefly pet one during winter cold. In our first year here we’ve seen a lot of these but these photos were the first we’d seen of their blue chests. The blue tailed five-lined skink in the wheelbarrow popped out of a debris pile and is a juvenile form of the red headed adult we have yet to see. The six-lined racerunner males also display a powdery shade of blue during mating season. I think they all are appreciating the addition of large cactus as additional playground equipment.

The lizards here outdo those in Estero, in variety, color and amusing behavior. Almost all we ever saw before the move was the abundant and invasive brown anole and rarely the native green anole. Here we have a healthy population of green anole along with several others we had not seen before, but the hilarious Eastern fence lizard male doing competitive push-ups in his deep blue-bellied mating phase coloration to impress the nearby female took first prize by me. These fearless little pit bulls keep us company during morning coffee on the porch, though I suspect bug meals has more to do with it than being social. I was able to reach out and briefly pet one during winter cold. In our first year here we’ve seen a lot of these but these photos were the first we’d seen of their blue chests. The blue tailed five-lined skink in the wheelbarrow popped out of a debris pile and is a juvenile form of the red headed adult we have yet to see. The six-lined racerunner males also display a powdery shade of blue during mating season. I think they all are appreciating the addition of large cactus as additional playground equipment.

jvfreeman

James V. Freeman is an established visual artist (oil painting) with a deep interest in natural history, plants and farming. He has had numerous solo shows, a solo museum show, an upcoming museum show and his work has been featured in many publications to date. He currently has a studio in Williston, Fl at the family farm and homestead, "Cactus Island", and as a farmer, specializes in growing columnar cacti of the Caribbean and Gulf countries as well as the aquatic Madegascar Lace Plant. James and his mom Sharon manage and develop the permaculture homestead.

2 Comments

Catherine M Nagel

June 2, 2020 at 3:48 pm

These are great pics -the lizards are so colorful. They look pretty healthy and sort of comical lol.
- James V Freeman
  
  June 2, 2020 at 8:21 pm
  
  These characters are a barrel of laughs. Little puppies under foot and always looking for a bug treat. Almost backed into a mock viper today, turned out to be a harmless hognose snake.