|
Typhlosaurus Lomiae
Lomi's blind legless skink (''Typhlosaurus lomiae'') is a species of lizard in the subfamily Acontinae of the family Scincidae. The species is endemic to Little Namaqualand in South Africa. Etymology The specific name ''lomiae'' honours Miss Lomi Wessels Brown, Collection Manager of lower vertebrates and invertebrates at the Transvaal Museum since 1976. Taxonomy In 1986 South African herpetologist Wulf Dietrich Haacke originally named this species ''Typhlosaurus lomii'', which is masculine (genitive singular). In 2004 J. Pieter Michels and Aaron Matthew Bauer corrected the specific name to ''lomiae'', which is feminine (genitive singular) because it honors a woman. Michels JP, Bauer AM (2004). "Some corrections to the scientific names of amphibians and reptiles". ''Bonner Zoologische Beiträge'' 52: 83–94. Description ''T. lomiae'' is limbless, blind, slender, and small. The usual snout-to-vent length (SVL) of adults is . Dorsally, it is bright goldish pink, while ventrall ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Watkins (zoologist)
Michael Watkins is a British shipbroker and zoologist. He is known for his books about the eponym An eponym is a noun after which or for which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. Adjectives derived from the word ''eponym'' include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Eponyms are commonly used for time periods, places, innovati ...s of species. Watkins is co-author of the books ''Whose Bird?: Men and Women Commemorated in the Common Names of Birds'', ''The Eponym Dictionary of Mammals'', ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles'', ''The Eponym Dictionary of Amphibians'',https://oaj.fupress.net/index.php/ah/article/view/1699/1699 and ''The Eponym Dictionary of Birds''. The book ''Whose Bird?'' details more than 4,000 people who have been commemorated with common names of birds and was originally conceived as a method of raising money for the Disabled Birders Association. Publications * Beolens, B. & Watkins, M. (2003). ''Whose Bird?: Men and women commemorated in t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endemic Reptiles Of South Africa
Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, the Cape sugarbird is found exclusively in southwestern South Africa and is therefore said to be ''endemic'' to that particular part of the world. An endemic species can also be referred to as an ''endemism'' or, in scientific literature, as an ''endemite''. Similarly, many species found in the Western ghats of India are examples of endemism. Endemism is an important concept in conservation biology for measuring biodiversity in a particular place and evaluating the risk of extinction for species. Endemism is also of interest in evolutionary biology, because it provides clues about how changes in the environment cause species to undergo range shifts (potentially expanding their range into a larger area or becomin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Skinks Of Africa
Skinks are a type of lizard belonging to the family Scincidae, a family in the infraorder Scincomorpha. With more than 1,500 described species across 100 different taxonomic genera, the family Scincidae is one of the most diverse families of lizards. Skinks are characterized by their smaller legs in comparison to typical lizards and are found in different habitats except arctic and subarctic regions. Etymology The word ''skink'', which entered the English language around 1580–1590, comes from classical Greek and Latin , names that referred to various specific lizards. Description Skinks look like lizards of the family Lacertidae (sometimes called ''true lizards''), but most species of skinks have no pronounced neck and relatively small legs. Several genera (e.g., '' Typhlosaurus'') have no limbs at all. This is not true for all skinks, however, as some species such as the red-eyed crocodile skink have a head that is very distinguished from the body. These lizards also have ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Typhlosaurus
''Typhlosaurus'' is a genus of African lizards, one of a number of genera of limbless lizards in the skink family ( Scincidae). In 2010 this group was revised, and most species formerly attributed to ''Typhlosaurus'' were placed in the genus ''Acontias''. As of 2025 the definition of ''Typhlosaurus'' includes five attenuate body legless lizards from southwestern Africa (South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, and Angola). This is the sister genus to ''Acontias'', which together form the well supported Afrotropical subfamily Acontinae. Species Five species are recognized as being valid. www.reptile-database.org. *'' Typhlosaurus braini'' Haacke, 1964 – Haacke's legless skink, Brain's legless skink, Brain's blind legless skink *'' Typhlosaurus caecus'' (Cuvier, 1817) – southern blind legless skink, Cuvier's legless skink *'' Typhlosaurus lomiae'' Haacke, 1986 – Lomi's blind legless skink *'' Typhlosaurus meyeri'' Boettger, 1894 – Meyer's blind legless skink, variable blind le ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arend Friedrich August Wiegmann
Arend Friedrich August Wiegmann (2 June 1802 – 15 January 1841) was a German zoologist and herpetologist born in Braunschweig. He studied medicine and philology at the University of Leipzig, and afterwards was an assistant to Martin Lichtenstein (1780–1857) in Berlin. In 1828 he became a professor at University of Cologne, and two years later was an extraordinary professor at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin. Wiegmann specialized in the study of herpetology and mammalogy. In 1835, he founded, together with other scholars, the zoological periodical '' Archiv für Naturgeschichte'', also known as "Wiegmann's Archive". With Johann Friedrich Ruthe (1788–1859) he wrote an important textbook of zoology called ''Handbuch der Zoologie'', and in 1834 Wiegmann published ''Herpetologia Mexicana'', a monograph on the reptiles of Mexico. In 1841 he died of tuberculosis at the age of 38 in Berlin. His father Arend Friedrich Wiegmann (1771–1853) was a German research ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Viviparity
In animals, viviparity is development of the embryo inside the body of the mother, with the maternal circulation providing for the metabolic needs of the embryo's development, until the mother gives birth to a fully or partially developed juvenile that is at least metabolically independent. This is opposed to oviparity, where the embryos develop independently outside the mother in eggs until they are developed enough to break out as hatchlings; and ovoviviparity, where the embryos are developed in eggs that remain carried inside the mother's body until the hatchlings emerge from the mother as juveniles, similar to a live birth. Etymology The term "viviparity" and its adjective form "viviparous" both derive from the Latin ''vivus'', meaning "living"; and ''pario'', meaning "give birth to". Reproductive mode Five modes of reproduction have been differentiated in animals based on relations between zygote and parents. The five include two nonviviparous modes: ovulipari ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Termite
Termites are a group of detritivore, detritophagous Eusociality, eusocial cockroaches which consume a variety of Detritus, decaying plant material, generally in the form of wood, Plant litter, leaf litter, and Humus, soil humus. They are distinguished by their moniliform antennae and the soft-bodied, unpigmented worker caste for which they have been commonly termed "white ants"; however, they are not ants but highly Apomorphy and synapomorphy, derived cockroaches. About 2,997 extant species are currently described, 2,125 of which are members of the family Termitidae. Termites comprise the infraorder Isoptera, or alternatively the Taxonomic rank#All ranks, epifamily Termitoidae, within the order Blattodea (the cockroaches). Termites were once classified in a separate Order (biology), order from cockroaches, but recent phylogenetic studies indicate that they evolved from cockroaches, as they are deeply nested within the group, and the sister group to wood-eating cockroaches of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Veld
Veld ( or , Afrikaans language, Afrikaans and Dutch language, Dutch: ''veld'', field), also spelled veldt, is a type of wide-open, rural landscape in Southern Africa. Particularly, it is a flat area covered in grass or low scrubland, scrub, especially in the countries of South Africa, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, and Botswana. A certain subtropical woodland ecoregion of Southern Africa has been officially defined as the Bushveld by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Trees are not abundant; frost, fire, and grazing animals allow grass to grow, but prevent the build-up of dense foliage. Etymology The word ''veld'' () comes from the Afrikaans language, Afrikaans word for "field". The etymological origin is older modern Dutch language, Dutch ''veldt'', a spelling that the History of Dutch orthography, Dutch abandoned in favour of ''veld'' during the 19th century, decades before the first Afrikaans dictionary.Eric Anderson Walker (ed). The Cambridge History of the British E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Habitat
In ecology, habitat refers to the array of resources, biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species' habitat can be seen as the physical manifestation of its ecological niche. Thus "habitat" is a species-specific term, fundamentally different from concepts such as Biophysical environment, environment or vegetation assemblages, for which the term "habitat-type" is more appropriate. The physical factors may include (for example): soil, moisture, range of temperature, and Luminous intensity, light intensity. Biotic index, Biotic factors include the availability of food and the presence or absence of Predation, predators. Every species has particular habitat requirements, habitat generalist species are able to thrive in a wide array of environmental conditions while habitat specialist species require a very limited set of factors to survive. The habitat of a species is not necessarily found in a ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Roy Branch
William Roy "Bill" Branch (12 May 1946, London, England – 14 October 2018, Port Elizabeth, South Africa) was a British-South-African herpetologist. Branch studied at the University of Southampton where he remained until completing his Ph.D. degree (''Studies on a foetal-specific alpha-globulin FPin the rabbit'' ). From 1972 he worked as a scientist in the Life Sciences Division of the Atomic Energy Board in Pretoria doing research on, inter alia, liver cancer, but returned to the University of Southampton in 1976 to take up a post-doctoral research fellowship in the Department of Biology studying the synthesis of chemicals in the liver of foetal rabbits. He started working at Port Elizabeth Museum in 1979 and retired in 2011, when he was appointed as Research Associate and Curator Emeritus. Over a period of almost 40 years he conducted field work in about 20 African countries and played a major role in building up the large reptile and amphibian collections at the Museum. Publ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dorsum (anatomy)
Standard anatomical terms of location are used to describe unambiguously the anatomy of humans and other animals. The terms, typically derived from Latin or Greek roots, describe something in its standard anatomical position. This position provides a definition of what is at the front ("anterior"), behind ("posterior") and so on. As part of defining and describing terms, the body is described through the use of anatomical planes and axes. The meaning of terms that are used can change depending on whether a vertebrate is a biped or a quadruped, due to the difference in the neuraxis, or if an invertebrate is a non-bilaterian. A non-bilaterian has no anterior or posterior surface for example but can still have a descriptor used such as proximal or distal in relation to a body part that is nearest to, or furthest from its middle. International organisations have determined vocabularies that are often used as standards for subdisciplines of anatomy. For example, '' Termi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
