Stress Eating Lizards (Herpes in the News)

    Colorado Checkered Whiptails (Aspidoscelis neotesselatus) are a species of lizard found exclusively in southeastern Colorado. The most unique thing about this species is that they are actually all females. There is no need for males, as this species reproduces asexually by releasing an egg that will become an exact clone of the mother.

Recently, testing was done on this species to examine how noise levels in the environment affect a population. Blood was taken and examined and scientists found that this species had considerably elevated stress levels. Understandably, because the environment that these lizards live in happens to be a grassland that military aircrafts make frequent flys over. The US Army’s Fort Carson Military Base in Colorado Springs coincides with the habitat these lizards are native to.

An interesting adaptation in response to these raised stress levels experienced in these lizards is stress eating! The lizards have begun to eat more and move around less, likely to replenish energy lost to the body’s response to stress. This is especially interesting to scientists, as noise tends to lead to a freeze response in animals that prompts them to eat less, as they are constantly wary of their surroundings.

Not only is this study important to consider when thinking about how species deal with environmental stress and interactions with human noise in general, but also is an interesting story when considering military occupancy in areas. When I move to Hawai’i following graduation I would be interested in looking at how the species around the Joint Base Pearl Harbor- Hickam are affected by the noise of the aircrafts. Additionally, how sea life is disrupted by the naval base.

Weisberger, M. (2023, March 29). This lizard species stress-eats to cope with noisy US Army Aircraft. CNN. Retrieved March 30, 2023, from https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/americas/lizards-stress-eat-scn/index.html