| Ses Aligues population not studied PÉREZ-MELLADO & SALVADOR, 1988 Podarcis lilfordi addayae PÉREZ-MELLADO, 1997 Ses Àguiles population ZAWADZKI & VAN DEN BERG, 2015 Escull de Ses Àguiles ESU PÉREZ-CEMBRANOS et al., 2020 |
Pérez-Mellado, V. & Salvador, A. (1988) - The Balearic lizard Podarcis lilfordi (Günther, 1874) (Sauria, lacertidae) of Menorca. - Arquivos do Museu Bocage (Nova Série), 1(10): 127-195.   × A studie was carried out on 17 populations of Podarcis lilfordi inhabiting the islets off the coast of Menorca (Balearic Islands). Pattern and colouring together with the statistical analysis performed suggested that the menorcan rassenkreis comprises a total of 9 subspecies. The evolutionary processes involved appear to be fundamentally governed by the age of the islets, their distance from the coast and by their ecological conditions. Though in certain cases it may be postulated that genetic drift may have acted as a differentiating mechanism in populations which were initially small. However, interpretation of the microevolutionary processin Menorca is more difficult thnin the case of other rassenkreis of the Balearic Islands due to extinction of the `mother` population on the main island. Pérez-Mellado, V. (1997) - Podarcis lilfordi (GÜNTHER, 1874). Lagartija balear. - p. 361-363 in PLEGUEZUELOS, J.M. (Ed.): Distribución y biogeografía de los anfibios y reptiles en España y Portugal. – Monográfica Tierras del Sur, 19. Universidad de Granada, Asociación Herpetológica Española. Granada, 542 pp. Zawadzki, M. & Berg, M.P. van den (2015) - Lizards in the mist - and a shot in the dark. The search for the terra typica of Podarcis lilfordi carbonerae PÉREZ-MELLADO & SALVADOR, 1988. - L@CERTIDAE, 2015 [8]: 160-191. × As a result of their taxonomical study of the populations of the Balearic lizard of Menorca Pérez-Mellado & Salvador (1988) described three new subspecies of Podarcis lilfordi. The type series of one of them, Podarcis lilfordi carbonerae, had been collected on an island called “Isla Carbonera” in 1933. The fact that their describers could not find this islet on any map, but did not hesitate to describe these lizards as a new subspecies, was not very reasonable and surely contributed to the mystery that should surround this subspecies from now on. But it was not this fact alone that casted a bad light on this taxonomic revision, because in-depth analyses revealed more awkward mistakes. Even the rediscovery of Podarcis lilfordi carbonerae by Pérez-Mellado et al. (2002) was only based on assumptions but did not contain any scientific proof. In this paper we give new information on the possible terra typica of Podarcis lilfordi carbonerae by introducing the Illa de Ses Mones. Because neither the En Carbó nor the Ses Mones lizards can be separated from the populations of the two nearby islands Illa Gran d’Addaia and Illa Petit d’Addaia by means of coloration or meristic and metric characters, we consider Podarcis lilfordi carbonerae Pérez-Mellado & Salvador, 1988 as a synonym of Podarcis lilfordi addayae (Eisentraut, 1928). Pérez-Cembranos, A. & Pérez-Mellado, V. & Alemany, I. & Bassitta, M. & Terrasa, B. & Picornell, A. & Castro, J.A. & Brown, R.P. & Ramon, C. (2020) - Morphological and genetic diversity of the Balearic lizard, Podarcis lilfordi (Günther, 1874): Is it relevant to its conservation? - Diversity and Distributions. https://doi. org/10.1111/ddi.13107 × Aims: To characterize the genetic and morphological diversification of the endan- gered Balearic lizard Podarcis lilfordi and to assess the relevance of this diversity, and how it is described, to conservation measures.
Location: This study covers all the populations of the Balearic lizard, Podarcis lilfordi, present in its range of distribution at coastal islets of Menorca, Mallorca and Cabrera Archipelago.
Methods: We analysed genetic and morphological variation across the 43 known extant populations of the Balearic lizard, using mitochondrial and nuclear markers. We examined morphometric and scalation characters using, in some cases, phyloge- netically independent contrasts. We also incorporated the study of dorsal coloration and dorsal colour pattern including the analysis of melanism in several populations. Results: We detected clear genetic divergence between Menorcan populations and populations from Mallorca and Cabrera, in both nuclear and mtDNA markers, but genetic divergence is relatively low among different insular populations within these groups. In contrast, morphological divergence was substantial both between Menorcan and remaining populations and within these groups. Morphological traits, such as dorsal coloration, body size and the number and size of scales, seemed to be linked with differences in climatic conditions between populations. In addition, some traits, as melanism, showed a strong phylogenetic signal.
Main conclusions: The morphological and genetic diversity of the Balearic lizard is incongruent with the subspecies described in the classical taxonomic literature. Moreover, current populations differ not only in some genetic and morphological features, but also in several ecological and ethological characteristics, in many cases unique to one population. Based on our results, we propose abandoning the use of subspecies to describe the extraordinary morphological diversity of the Balearic liz- ard and its replacement with the concept of evolutionary significant units (ESUs). ESUs are particularly suitable to describe and recognize such diversity and, especially, to ensure the continuity of the evolutionary process.
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