New Monitor Lizard Discovered in Indonesia

[n2doc]

ScienceDaily (Apr. 26, 2010) — A newly discovered species of monitor lizard, a close relative of the Komodo dragon, was reported in the journal Zootaxa by a professor at UC Santa Barbara and a researcher from Finland.


Sam Sweet, a professor in the department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology at UCSB, and Valter Weijola, a graduate student at Abo Akademi University in Turku, Finland, are the first to describe the distinctive lizard, which lives in the Moluccan islands of east Indonesia. Sweet is an authority on monitor lizard biology.

The scientific name of this lizard is Varanus obor; its popular names are Torch monitor and Sago monitor. It's called Torch monitor because of its bright orange head with a glossy black body. Obor means torch in Indonesian. It is a close relative of the fruit-eating monitor lizard recently reported from the Philippines. The Torch monitor can grow to nearly four feet in length, and thrives on a diet of small animals and carrion.

The Torch monitor exists only on the small island of Sanana in the western Moluccan islands. A unique aspect of this geographical region is the lack of mammalian predators, which may have given reptiles the space to evolve as the top terrestrial predators and scavengers. Several million years ago, this island was situated near New Guinea, and it is possible that the lizard lives on as a relic from that period. It is the only black monitor in its lineage, and the only monitor species anywhere that has evolved red pigmentation.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100426182024.htm

Now that we've "discovered" it, time to kill it off.. :sarcasm:

[blindpig]

1. The reptile dealers will be hot for this one.

Some rich bastard is liable to pay $20-50K for one and the most notorious animal smuggler in the world is based in Indonesia.

Sometimes I don't know why they publish this information, it's like a fuckin' dinner bell.

[jberryhill]

2. Tastes Like Chicken! /nt

[Laura902]

3. I read about this on national geographic.org a few months ago

We think were so smart compared to other animals and with all of our technology not only do we destroy them but don't even know they exist.