Image courtesy of Kathrin
Glaw, fair use doctrine.
Joel Kontinen
This chameleon brings
to mind the Bible’s story of the Lazarus. whom Jesus Restored to life.
Global Wildlife Conservation
spearheaded the expedition as part of its Search for Lost Species program, an attempt to rediscover species that
have not been observed by scientists for at least a decade. The goal is to use
the discoveries to promote conservation of not only those elusive species, but
of their broader habitats and ecosystems.
The Voeltzkow's chameleon was
a particularly obscure quarry. Little is known about the chameleon's lifestyle,
but its close relatives live fast and die young. For instance, the Labord's
chameleon (Furcifer labordi), another Madagascar native, hatches
in November, matures, lays eggs and is dead by March. Researchers knew that
Voelzkow's chameleons would not only be small, they'd be present for only about
half the year if they were like the Labord's chameleon.
The expedition team headed into
the forests of northwestern Madagascar in April 2018. At first, they didn't
have much luck.
"I thought we might have a
good chance of rediscovering Voeltzkow's chameleon, but I was surprised that it
took so long and that it was so difficult," Frank Glaw, head of the
Department of Vertebrates at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology, who led
the expedition, said in a statement. "Our efforts were entirely
unsuccessful during most of the trip to find it where we thought it would most
likely be."
Finally, days before the trip was to end, Angeluc Razafimanantsoa, a
professional guide from Montagne d'Ambre in northern Madagascar, spotted one of
the chameleons. Ultimately, the team discovered three males and 15
females.
Female
Voeltzkow's are smaller than males, the researchers discovered, growing to
about 5.9 inches (150 millimeters) tip-to-tail. Males can be up to 6.5 inches
(164 mm) long. Males are light green, but flash darker green stripes when angry
or stressed.
When relaxed, females are green
with darker green stripes and red dots along their sides. When they get
stressed, those dark green stripes turn black and a purplish streak appears
along the chameleon's sides. Between the black stripes, the female chameleon's'
skin goes white, except for their throats, which can flash a bright
orange.
The chameleons
were found climbing trees on the grounds of a bungalow-style hotel called
Madame Chabaud in the town of Katsepy. The owner there told the researchers
that the distinctive chameleons are abundant around the hotel at the peak of
the wet season in January through March. Nevertheless, the researchers wrote in
Salamandra, the chameleons might qualify as endangered because they live in
such a small geographical region, and because their habitat as become
fragmented.
Though the researchers
were elated to find the Voeltzkow's chameleons, they could not find Furcifer monoceras, another chameleon they had
hoped to see on the expedition. This species is known from only one specimen,
collected in 1905, and has not been recorded since.
Source:
Pappas, Stephanie, 2020. Lost' chameleon rediscovered after a century in hiding. And it's spectacular.
3 November. Live Science
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