The correlates of foraging mode in a community of Brazilian lizards.

Abstract

Three measures of foraging intensity - speed, frequency of movement, and area utilized - were used to rank 4 sympatric lizards on a scale of intensity of foraging, viz Ameiva ameiva > Cnemidophorus lemniscatus > Kentropyx striatus > Anolis auratus. The first 3 species are teiids, and generally are regarded as wide-foraging. Four characteristics (activity temperatures, relative clutch mass, amount of termites in the diet, and amount of active insects in the diet) that have been found to differentiate wide-foraging lizards from sit-and-wait lizards differed among the teiids in a manner predictable from the intesity of their foraging. Three other characteristics (relative tail length, mean size of active prey, and food intake) did not correlate with intensity of foraging of the teiids. -from Authors