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Male of Erhard's Wall Lizard (Podarcis erhardii) in the ruins of Ag. Achilleos
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The Aegean Wall Lizard,
Podarcis erhardii inhabits the Balkan peninsula and the Aegean islands. On the mainland it ranges from Albania, the Republic of Macedonia and southern Bulgaria to the northeastern part of the Peloponnese peninsula in Greece. Donihue (2016) tested for foraging mode switching between populations of the Aegean wall lizard,
Podarcis erhardii, inhabiting undisturbed habitat and human-built rock walls on the Greek island of Naxos. He observed foraging behavior among 10 populations and tested lizard morphological and performance predictions at each site. He also investigated the diet of lizards at each site relative to the available invertebrate community.He found that lizards living on rock walls were significantly more sedentary—sit and wait—than lizards at nonwall sites. He also found that head width increased in females and the ratio of hind limbs to forelimbs in both sexes increased as predicted. Diet also changed, with non-wall lizards consuming a higher proportion of sedentary prey. This study demonstrates microgeographic variability in lizard foraging mode as a result of human land use. In addition, these results demonstrate that foraging mode syndromes can shift intraspecifically with potential cascading effects on local ecological communities. Lacertids are considered a clade of active foraging species and the populations on Naxos from habitats that reflect the pre-human landscape in Greece were active foragers.
Citation
Donihue CM. 2016. Aegean wall lizards switch foraging modes, diet, and morphology in a human‐built environment. Ecology and Evolution. DOI: 10.1002/ece3.2501
