Cordylus cordylus

Cape girdled lizard
	At Mountain Zebra N.P., Eastern Cape
Conservation status
	; Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Reptilia
Order:	Squamata
Family:	Cordylidae
Genus:	Cordylus
Species:	C. cordylus
Binomial name
	Cordylus cordylus; Linnaeus, 1758

Cordylus cordylus, the Cape girdled lizard, is a medium-sized lizard indigenous to the southern Cape region of South Africa, where it inhabits crags, rocky outcrops and mountain summits. They evade predators by wedging themselves firmly in rock cracks.^{[citation needed]}

Description

Specimen from the Western Cape

The Cape girdled lizard has a golden-brown body with spiny, keeled body scales, especially on its tail.^{[citation needed]}

Range

It is indigenous to the Western and Eastern Cape provinces of South Africa, from Saldanha and Cape Town eastwards as far as Lesotho. ^{[citation needed]}

Food

They feed on insects, which are caught by rushing and pouncing.^{[citation needed]}

Habits

They live in large colonies (with social hierarchies) on crags, rocky outcrops and mountain summits. They can often be seen sunbathing on top of prominent rocks. The lizards hide in rocky cracks, but come out in the morning and evening to forage. If threatened, they retreat to their holes and cracks in the rocks, wedge themselves in and lock their bodies there by inflating their lungs. Jammed into the cracks like this, with their thorny tail wrapped protectively over their faces, they are incredibly difficult to prise out.^{[citation needed]}

Reproduction

In the autumn, the females give birth to one or two young, which stay very near the mother for the first year. ^{[citation needed]}

References

^ Bates, M.F.; Mouton, P.L.F.N. (2018). "Cordylus cordylus". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2018: e.T110159331A115674365. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2018-2.RLTS.T110159331A115674365.en. Retrieved 18 November 2021.