REPTILIA: SQUAMATA: IGUANIDAE: Corythophanes

Corythophanes cristatus

Crested tree iguana

Photos & text by Dr. Robert Sprackland.

Range: Southern Central America and northern South America.

Diagnosis: Lizards in which the head is nearly half as long as the body, there is a single huge crest on the head and nape, and the tail is very thin and barely longer than the body.

Description: Head with pronounced ridge from above the eyes to the snout tip. Eyes large, but with relatively small apertures; each eye capable of independent movement. Labials large, other head scales small. A serrated row of scales midventrally from mental to throat. A huge, squarish crest originates  just behind the eyes and extends to behind the shoulders, where it becomes  a low dorsal crest.

Body scales heterogeneous, keeled. A skin fold extends from the front of the shoulder to nearly mid-body. Limbs long and very thin, the hind limbs somewhat longer than the front legs. Toes very long, pentadactyl, and with sharp recurved claws. The tail is cylindrical, nearly uniform its whole length, and quite distinct from the body. Tail prehensile and covered with conspicuously keeled scales.

Natural History: The crested tree iguana parallels the Old World chameleons in several ways. The short, prehensile tail helps these tree-dwellers hold onto narrow branches. The lizards are slow moving and generally stalk prey by moving very slowly until within striking distance.

Reproduction: Lays eggs.

Taxonomy & Relationships: Though a small slow-moving tree climber, crested tree iguanas are most closely related to the semiaquatic basilisks and the arboreal cone-headed iguanas.

Variation:

Additional Comments:

Type Specimen:

 Literature:

Lang, Mathias. 1989. Phylogenetic and biogeographic patterns of basiliscine iguanians (Reptilia: Squamata: "Iguanidae"). Bonner Zoologische Monographien Nr. 28.