Giant Girdled Lizard

The Giant girdled lizard is a large lizard from South Africa. Its back is brown in color with different shades and the abdomen is yellowish to brown. Its throat and mouth are yellow. The skin of this lizard is hygroscopic and is able to absorb moisture. The tail is quite strong and covered with strong scales. Giant girdled lizards are native to Highveld grasslands in the interior of South Africa.

Unlike most of its relatives that live among rocks, the Giant girdled lizard lives in self-excavated burrows (typically 0.4 m or 1.3 ft deep, and 1.8 m or 6 ft long) in the silty soil. This species is also known as the sungazer due to its distinctive thermoregulatory behavior; it elevates the anterior parts of the body by extending its forelimbs, usually doing so near the entrance of its burrow as if looking at the sun. Giant girdled lizards live in colonies and are active during the day. In order to protect themselves, they use their tail or pretend to be dead.

Giant girdled lizards are carnivores (insectivores). They mainly feed on various insects but occasionally eat small vertebrates and even some plants. The decline in Giant girdled lizard numbers is caused by habitat destruction, and illegal collecting for the pet and traditional medicine trades. Entire colonies of these reptiles can disappear when a patch of native grassland is converted to farmland or otherwise "developed". According to the IUCN Red List, the total population size of the Giant girdled lizard is 677,000 mature individuals. Currently, this species is classified as Vulnerable (VU) on the IUCN Red List and its numbers today are decreasing.