Rare Species of Chameleons Thought to be Extinct Struggles to Survive, Study Reveals

(CNN) – Researchers found a tiny chameleon species that was thought to be extinct due to deforestation, but is struggling to survive.

The critically endangered Chapman’s pygmy chameleon (Rhampholeon chapmanorum) measures just 5.5 centimeters and is native to the low-lying rainforest in the hills of Malawi in the south of the country. according to a study published Aug. 3 in Oryx — The International Journal of Conservation.

Described for the first time by herpetologist and author Colin Tilbury in 1992, Chapman’s pygmy chameleon is one of the rarest chameleons in the world.

“They’re mostly brown, but they can change to very beautiful blues and greens with little dots all over the body, and it’s probably a way of communicating with each other,” said study lead author Krystal Tolley, a professor and research leader at the Leslie Hill Molecular Ecology Laboratory of the South African National Institute of Biodiversity, it’s a statement.

“Other species of chameleons can be hysterical, hiss and bite, but pygmy chameleons are gentle and just beautiful,” he added.

The risk of extinction for chameleons is much higher than the 15% average for the order of reptiles to which they belong. 34% of chameleon species are classified as threatened and 18% near threatened, the authors wrote. Most of the threatened species are forest specialists, which means that they can only live in a specific type of environment.

In search of the species

When Tilbury described for the first time On pygmy chameleons in 1992, researchers observed signs of considerable deforestation in the hills of Malawi, the authors of the current study wrote.

According to the study, to protect the species from further damage, 37 pygmy chameleons were released from the Malawi hills in 1998 in a forested area about 95 kilometers to the north in Mikundi, Malawi. When Tilbury assessed the release site in 2001 and 2012, the chameleons were still there.

Since pygmy chameleons do not tolerate modified areas and Tolley did not discover any pygmy chameleons during a related evaluation work in 2014, they were thought to have possibly become extinct.

His work led the International Union for Conservation of Nature to include chameleons in its Red List of Threatened Species as a critically endangered species. Using historical (1984-1985) and recent (2019) Google Earth satellite imagery of the Malawi Hills and another geographic information system, the authors of the current study estimated that about 80% of the Malawi Hills forest had been destroyed. from 1984 to 2019.

At night, on the trails of three accessible forest plots in 2016, the authors walked using flashlights to find and record chameleons.

The first and many others

Chapman’s pygmy chameleon is one of the rarest chameleons in the world, now clinging to survival in small patches of forest in a highly disturbed ecosystem.

“The first one we found was in the transition zone, at the edge of the forest, where there are some trees but mostly corn and yucca plants,” Tolley said.

“When we found it we got goose bumps and we started jumping. We didn’t know if we would get more, but once we got into the forest there were a lot of them, although I don’t know how long it will last.”

The researchers found seven adult chameleons along a trail just inside the first patch of forest in the Malawi Hills; 10 chameleons within a site more than 6 kilometers southwest of the first; and 21 adult chameleons plus 11 juveniles and hatchlings within the Mikundi plot, the site of the 1998 release.

Pygmy chameleons are still in danger

After cutting 2-millimeter-long tail fragments from some adult chameleons, the authors did a genetic analysis.

The authors found that the genetic diversity of the chameleons was normal compared to that of other chameleons and small-sized reptile species. But there were significant differences in the genetic makeup between the populations in the different zones, suggesting that the humans who fragmented the forest patches had disrupted the ability to reproduce between the chameleons in neighboring patches and thus their gene flow, an impact that increases the risk of extinction due to fewer mate options, the authors wrote.

However, the authors could have overestimated the amount of genetic diversity between populations by not taking into account how part of the DNA is inherited, said Eric Routman, emeritus professor of biology at San Francisco State University, who was not involved. in the study.

“And even if they had many locules and good genetic estimates, they have no estimate of these genetic parameters before habitat fragmentation, so they cannot attribute any genetic effects to deforestation,” Routman added by email. “If I had reviewed this work, I would have recommended major revisions to the manuscript. Essentially, the genetic part of their study is not conclusive.”

Inmediate attention

The authors believe that the effects of deforestation on genetic diversity could take time to appear. But to prevent the chameleon species from reaching a point of no return, the loss of rainforest requires immediate attention, Tolley said.

“Urgent conservation measures need to be taken, such as stopping the destruction of the rainforest and restoring habitat to promote connectivity.” Although part of the Malawi hills is within a key biodiversity area (the Matandwe Forest Reserve), most of the forest lies outside the reserve’s boundaries, and the reserve’s effectiveness is questionable, given that the most of the destruction has occurred within its limits, “the authors wrote.

“Although expanding the reserve to cover all forest patches would be a first step, measures are needed to prevent the destruction of the remaining patches.”

These efforts would also be important for any other species possibly living among these chameleons, the authors wrote. And there could be more pygmy chameleons in the patches that they couldn’t explore, they said.

For the little creatures Polley described as gentle and beautiful, “both planning and recommended actions require strong personal leadership, stakeholder engagement, including with government departments, and sufficient funding to ensure success,” the authors added. .

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