Lizards can change their diet to avoid predators

Washington, December 3 (ANI): In a new research, scientists have shown that a particular lizard species from the Negev Desert in the Near East changes its diet to avoid predators.

The research was done by Valentin Perez-Mellado, a scientist from the University of Salamanca and Dror Hawlena from Yale University.

According to the study, these reptiles move less and catch less mobile and different prey if they are under pressure from predators.

Many theoretical models had predicted this result, but until now there had been very few experimental trials and none in the case of saurians (reptiles).

This experiment has shown that certain animals, such as the insectivore lizard Acanthodactylus beershebensis, can change their behaviour and diet to avoid being eaten.

"When there is greater pressure from predators, the individuals tend to move less and catch more mobile prey from somewhat different groups," said Perez-Mellado.

"The lizards' diet and food-seeking behaviour changed significantly when we experimentally increased the predation pressure on them," he added.

The study shows that reptiles threatened by predators become less selective and eat a more diverse range of foods, according to Perez-Mellado, who was in charge of analysing their diet in Spain.

The field work done over the summer months in 2000 and 2001 in the Negev Desert in Israel was carried out by Hawlena.

The scientists studied the species' diet data (trophic ecology) in two different situations - with and without predators.

The Spanish researcher analysed the contents of 327 faecal pellets taken from 291 different lizards in order to reconstruct their diet.

Ants were the prey most commonly consumed by the lizards, both by those at risk (69.32 percent) and the controls (67.12 percent), followed by insects such as termites (19.14 percent and 19.17 percent respectively).

The difference could be clearly seen in the consumption of seeds, because the lizards hardly consumed these (0.52 percent) when they were under threat from predators. (ANI)