Reintroduction of Zebra-Tailed Lizard

archived

Zebra-tailed lizard (ZTL; Callisaurus draconoides) is a characteristic, relatively common Mohave and Sonoran Desert species throughout the lower elevation deserts of the Southwest (Brennon and Holycross 2006). ZTL is a medium-sized, insectivorous iguanoid lizard that prefers sandy desert habitats, which are often dominated by creosote-bush (Larrea tridentata). While still existing in the middle Peach Springs Wash drainage, the only ZTL population in the Colorado River ecosystem (CRE) in Grand Canyon previously occurred in the super-riparian sand dunes at the mouth of Diamond Creek on Hualapai Indian Reservation. That population was extirpated in the mid-1980’s when high flows on the Colorado River flooded the mouth of Diamond Creek and large trucks used the dune-top area for staging river take-outs. Off-road vehicular impacts are well-known to negatively affect diurnal reptile species, such as ZTL. Repeated censuses for ZTL at the mouth of Diamond Creek from the late 1980’s through 2010 have consistently failed to reveal any of these conspicuous, diurnal lizards, and the population has been extirpated.

High