| Syntypes: NMW 16254, NMW 16255 etc.
Holotype: DZUL (probably). Live adult male, at the time of description (January 1989) in the custody of the `Dirección General del Medio Arhbiente` (Head Office of the Environment) of the regional Government of the Canary Islands. Captured in November 1985 by Mr. Carlos Naeslund and kept in captivity in the field station of Frontera (Hierro Island). The holotype will be deposited in the Museo Insular des Sciencias Naturales, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, after its death. |
| LÓPEZ-JURADO beschrieb 1989 die Population der Hauptinsel anhand angeblicher Unterschiede zur Population vom Salmor-Felsen als eigenständige Unterart G. s. machadoi. Der verfügbare Lebensraum am Roque Chico de Salmor ist sehr klein und es darf angenommen werden, dass hier niemals mehr als etwa 10 fortpflanzungsfähige Exemplare leben konnten. Solche Populationen sind aus den unterschiedlichsten Gründen sehr kurzlebig, sodass wir annehmen dürfen, dass diese Population auf keinen Fall mehr als einige hundert Jahre alt war, als sie schließlich ausstarb. Da sie sich zweifellos aus verdrifteten Exemplaren (sehr wahrscheinlich einem einzigen befruchteten Weibchen) von der wenige hundert Meter entfernten Hauptinsel entwickelt hat, ist es geradezu abwegig anzunehmen, dass es sich dabei um unterschiedliche Unterarten handeln soll. Die beobachteten Unterschiede gehen wohl auf Gründereffekte und Gendrift zurück. Daher war es auch nicht gerade überraschend, dass genetische Untersuchungen keine Unterschiede zeigten.
WERNER MAYER, 2015 |
Steindachner, F. (1889) - Über eine von Prof. O. SIMONY auf den Roques del Zalmor bei Hierro, Canarische Inseln, entdeckte neue Eidechsenart. - Anzeiger der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Classe, Wien, 26: 259-263.  Bings, W. (1985) - Zur früheren Verbreitung von Gallotia simonyi auf Hierro, mit Vorschlägen zur Wiederansiedlung. - Bonner zoologische Beiträge, Bonn, 36 (3/4): 417-427.   × The cliff of Fuga de Gorreta on Hierro ist the last retreat of Gallotia simonyi. During a visit of the island in 1982 the author followefd old and new hints at the present and former occurrence of the lizard. However, it was not possible to document the present existence of the species outside the Fuga de Gorreta. In addition caves and concheros of the Guanches were investigated with respect to skeletal material. Several remains of lizards were found, some dentalia indicating a considerable size of the lizards. The findings also indicate that the lizards were eaten by the aboriginals. – Past and present records (woth one exception) are restricted to regions of old basaltic rocks. – From this understanding I propose to favour the following regions for re-introduction programs of Gallotia simonyi, especially in the case of successful captive breeding: 1) Southern slope Bco Los Cardones, 2) Southern slope Risci de los Herrenos, 3) Southern slope Bco of Tinor, 4) Smaller Zalmor Rock, and 5) Southern slope Bahia de los Reyes. López-Jurado, L.F. (1989) - A new Canarian lizard subspecies from Hierro Island (Canarian archipelago). - Bonner zoologische Beiträge, Bonn, 40: 265-272. Bischoff, W. (1998) - Die Reptilien der Kanarischen Inseln, der Selvagens-Inseln und des Madeira Archipels - Bischoff, W. (Hrsg.): Handbuch der Reptilien und Amphibien Europas. Band 6. - AULA-Verlag, Wiesbaden. × Das kleine »Galapagos vor der europäischen Haustür« ist Gegenstand dieses in sich geschlossenen Bandes. Er gibt erstmalig einen Überblick über die Herpetofauna dieser Inselgruppen. Molina Borja, M. & Rodriguez-Dominguez, M.A. (2004) - Evolution of biometric and life history traits in lizards (Gallotia) from the Canary islands. - Journal of Zoological Systematics and Evolutionary Research, Berlin, 42 (1): 44-53. × The aim was to study as to how biometric and life-history traits of endemic lacertids in the Canary Islands (genus Gallotia) may have evolved, and possible factors affecting the diversification process of this taxon on successively appearing islands have been deduced. To that end, comparative analyses of sexual dimorphism and scaling of different body, head and life-history traits to body size in 10 species/subspecies of Gallotia have been carried out. Both Felsenstein`s independent contrasts and Huey and Bennett`s `minimum evolution` analyses show that male and female snout-vent length (SVL) changed proportionally (sexual size dimorphism not changing with body size) throughout the evolution of these lizards and all within-sex biometric traits have changed proportionally to SVL. Life-history traits (size at sexual maturity, clutch size, hatchling SVL and mass, and life span) are highly correlated with adult female body size, the first two being the only traits with a positive allometry to female SVL. These results, together with the finding that the slope of hatchling SVL to female SVL regression was lower than that of SVL at maturity to female SVL, indicates that larger females reach maturity at a larger size, have larger clutches and, at the same time, have relatively smaller hatchlings than smaller females. There was no significant correlation between any pair of life-history traits after statistically removing the effect of body size. As most traits changed proportionally to SVL, the major evolutionary change has been that of body size (a ca. threefold change between the largest and the smallest species), that is suggested to be the effect of variable ecological conditions faced by founder lizards in each island. Cox, S.C. & Carranza, S. & Brown, R.P. (2010) - Divergence times and colonization of the Canary Islands by Gallotia lizards. - Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 56 (2): 747-757. × The Canary Islands have become a model region for evolutionary studies. We obtained 1.8 Kbp of mtDNA sequence from all known island forms of the endemic lizard genus Gallotia and from its sister taxon Psammodromus in order to reanalyze phylogenetic relationships within the archipelago, estimate lineage divergence times, and reconstruct the colonization history of this group. Well-supported phylogenies were obtained using maximum parsimony and Bayesian inference. Previous studies have been unable to establish the branching pattern at the base of the tree. We found evidence that G. stehlini (Gran Canaria) originated from the most basal Gallotia node and G. atlantica from the subsequent node. Divergence times were estimated under a global clock using Bayesian Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods implemented by three different programs: BEAST, MCMCTREE, MULTIDIVTIME. Node constraints were derived from subaerial island appearance data and were incorporated into the analyses as soft or hard maximal bounds. Posterior node ages differed slightly between programs, possibly due to different priors on divergence times. The most eastern Canary Islands first emerged just over 20 mya and their colonization appears to have taken place relatively quickly, around 17–20 mya. The subsequent node is consistent with cladogenesis due to colonization of Gran Canaria from the eastern islands about 11–13 mya. The western islands appear to have been colonized by a dispersal event from Lanzarote/Fuerteventura in the east to either La Gomera or one of the ancient edifices that subsequently formed Tenerife in the west, about 9–10 mya. Within the western islands, the most recent node that is ancestral to both the G. intermedia/G. gomerana/G. simonyi and the G. galloti/G. caesaris clades is dated at about 5–6 mya. Subsequent dispersal events between ancient Tenerife islands and La Gomera are dated at around 3 mya in both clades, although the direction of dispersal cannot be determined. Finally, we show that G. galloti is likely to have colonized La Palma more than 0.5 Ma after emergence of the island 1.77 mya, while G. caesaris from the same clade may have colonized El Hierro very soon after it emerged 1.12 mya. There are tentative indications that the large-bodied endangered G. simonyi colonized El Hierro around the same time or even later than the smaller-bodied G. caesaris. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of Bayesian dating of a phylogeny in helping reconstruct the historical pattern of dispersal across an oceanic archipelago.
|
