REPTILIA: SQUAMATA: GYMNOPHTHALMIDAE: Proctoporus

Proctoporus shrevei Parker, 1935

Flashlight lizard

Photos & text by Dr. Robert Sprackland.

Range: Known from a single cave deposit on Trinidad.

Diagnosis: A tiny lizard with large symmetrical body scales and large light-centered dark spots in series along the flanks.

Description:

Natural History: A remarkable lizard, as it is the only known bioluminescent terrestrial vertebrate on earth. The lizard was reported as luminescent by mammalogist Ivan Sanderson (1939), and repeated elsewhere (Neill, 1958; Parker, 1939; Pope, 1955) but the rarity of the species made confirmation impossible until the late 1990s. Herpetologist John Murphy claimed that Proctoporus shrevei was not luminescent (1996), but his specimens consisted of only young females. Subsequently, Mark O'Shea visited Sanderson's cave locality and photographed males that were undisputedly glowing (and aired on his television show, O'Shea's Big Adventure).

Reproduction:

Taxonomy & Relationships:

Variation:

Additional Comments:

Type Specimen: BMNH 1935.10.3.2, Trinidad (shown below).

Literature:

Boos, Hans. nd. Teeids [sic], Part 2. Trinidad Naturalist. 

Murphy, John. 1996. Glow in the dark lizards? Reptiles April:32-40.

Neill, Wilfred. 1958. Luminous life. Nature Magazine 51(4):177-180.

Parker, H. W. 1935. The new teiid lizard in Trinidad. Tropical Agriculture 12(11):283.

Parker, H. W. 1939. Luminous organs in lizards. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 40:658-660.

Pope, Clifford. 1955. The reptile world. Alfred A. Knopf, NY.

Roth, Willard, and Carl Gans. 1960. The luminous organs of Proctoporus (Sauria: Reptilia) -- a re-evaluation. Breviora 125:1-12.

Sanderson, Ivan. 1939. Caribbean treasure. Viking Press, NY.