Imagine a hungry group of youngsters bursting into a candy store where sweets are free for the taking--no cashiers asking for money, no one at the counter putting lids on the candy jars. Children flock to all corners of the store, spreading out evenly so each can claim an entire row of candy jars as their own. As more and more children flood into the shop, they fill the open spaces, packing themselves ever tighter until each child claims just a single jar of candy, not an entire row. As available candy jars dwindled, fewer and fewer children came into the candy store.
The first anole lizards who made their way from South America to the islands of the Caribbean forty thousand years ago encountered their own version of such a candy store.
Anoles, a group of lizards most closely related to iguanas, are among the most diverse groups of reptiles. There are more than 400 species of anoles and of those, nearly 100 species inhabit the islands of the Caribbean.
The islands of the Caribbean offered those first anole immigrants a smorgasbord of easy-to-catch food and plentiful available habitats. Consequently, they spread out across the spectrum of habitats and feasted on a variety of food resources.
Find out more about the anoles of the Caribbean here.
