This is a report on my observation and further musings on Lizard. {:D}
"Hibiscus is red in colour."
"Hibiscus is red in colour."
"Hibiscus is red ..."
And so on, the kid wrote his homework. After writing this for over fifty times, the kid was asked to draw and colour a hibiscus. He drew it well, alright, but coloured it blue! (Not that blue hibiscus does not exist, but the kid did not realise what he has been writing). Similarly, I have been ignorant of some aspect of lizard, though I have learnt it by heart in school. Well, I decided to write on this, because there are two lizards playing hide and seek in my room.
One night, I happened to watch a lizard crawl over light yellow painted wall of my room. The skin of the lizard was of a similar colour and appeared so smooth and velvetty, I felt if I touched it, the powder would stick to my finger just like when you catch a butterfly (I should have realised that aspect now, but it took longer). And then it crawled over to the dark brown painted wooden ventilator. A few minutes later, the lizard changed its colour from light yellow to dark brown! I was amazed to see a lizard change its colour. It was the first time I saw a lizard do it. I have seen chameleons and garden lizards do this camoflauge thingy, but never thought a lizard could do it. The thought soon began to prey on my mind. I wanted to figure out the mechanism of this colour change. I could have done a google search, but I did not. The only two colours I have seen the lizards in my room are light yellow and dark brown. And thats when it struck me: Lizards are reptiles! Yep, how foolish of me to forget this. Reptiles have scales. With scales, the mechanism to change colour is rather easy: have one side of the scale coloured light yellow and the other side dark brown. Scales are attached only at one end to the body. By flipping along the edge where scales are joined, lizards can look either yellow or brown. They can probably also bring about different shades by choosing to flip only a few scales. I do not know if this is what happens really. But its a possibility. And I was smiling, proud of having figured something out!
By the way, the powdery stuff that sticks to fingers when you catch a butterfly are scales too!
Now that I have explained the colour change, I now want to talk a little about the tail. The tail is infamous among the birds and snakes and cats to which lizards are prey. Thats because, the lizards can drop off the tail when attacked. The tail wriggles as if alive and confuses the enemy giving an oppurtunity for the lizard to run for its life. Whats marvelled in science is the ability of the lizard to regenerate the tail in a very short period. But when I came across this incident, what amused me was the tail that was left behind. It was dusk, when I was walking back to my room when on the corridor I saw a bird pecking at a lizard. The lizard dropped its tail. But the lizard was unfortunate. The bird ignored the wriggling tail and carried off the lizard (either the bird was intelligent or was greedy and took the larger piece!) Both the hunter and the hunted, having gone, I went closer to the tail that was still wriggling. It kept up for quite a long time, which I did not find so very interesting, because even in the most laziest human, the heart, eyes, liver and other organs stay alive for some hours after the death of the organism. Tired of watching, I went back to room. Almost an hour later, when I walked across the spot, the tail was still there. It had stopped moving. Curious as I was, I picked a twig and poked the tail and it started wriggling again. Now this was a surprise! When it stopped, I poked again and it moved again. This happened for sometime until, the tail was probably out of life!
The tail was sensitive to touch. I had always thought that the tail was programmed to wriggle randomly when dropped off. But no! To be sensitive to touch, it must be having a nervous system and a small localised brain to process the signals. The lizard is kind of an organism with out a mouth to feed, which is probably why it dies! This was another revelation to me.
Jade.
"Hibiscus is red in colour."
"Hibiscus is red in colour."
"Hibiscus is red ..."
And so on, the kid wrote his homework. After writing this for over fifty times, the kid was asked to draw and colour a hibiscus. He drew it well, alright, but coloured it blue! (Not that blue hibiscus does not exist, but the kid did not realise what he has been writing). Similarly, I have been ignorant of some aspect of lizard, though I have learnt it by heart in school. Well, I decided to write on this, because there are two lizards playing hide and seek in my room.
One night, I happened to watch a lizard crawl over light yellow painted wall of my room. The skin of the lizard was of a similar colour and appeared so smooth and velvetty, I felt if I touched it, the powder would stick to my finger just like when you catch a butterfly (I should have realised that aspect now, but it took longer). And then it crawled over to the dark brown painted wooden ventilator. A few minutes later, the lizard changed its colour from light yellow to dark brown! I was amazed to see a lizard change its colour. It was the first time I saw a lizard do it. I have seen chameleons and garden lizards do this camoflauge thingy, but never thought a lizard could do it. The thought soon began to prey on my mind. I wanted to figure out the mechanism of this colour change. I could have done a google search, but I did not. The only two colours I have seen the lizards in my room are light yellow and dark brown. And thats when it struck me: Lizards are reptiles! Yep, how foolish of me to forget this. Reptiles have scales. With scales, the mechanism to change colour is rather easy: have one side of the scale coloured light yellow and the other side dark brown. Scales are attached only at one end to the body. By flipping along the edge where scales are joined, lizards can look either yellow or brown. They can probably also bring about different shades by choosing to flip only a few scales. I do not know if this is what happens really. But its a possibility. And I was smiling, proud of having figured something out!
By the way, the powdery stuff that sticks to fingers when you catch a butterfly are scales too!
Now that I have explained the colour change, I now want to talk a little about the tail. The tail is infamous among the birds and snakes and cats to which lizards are prey. Thats because, the lizards can drop off the tail when attacked. The tail wriggles as if alive and confuses the enemy giving an oppurtunity for the lizard to run for its life. Whats marvelled in science is the ability of the lizard to regenerate the tail in a very short period. But when I came across this incident, what amused me was the tail that was left behind. It was dusk, when I was walking back to my room when on the corridor I saw a bird pecking at a lizard. The lizard dropped its tail. But the lizard was unfortunate. The bird ignored the wriggling tail and carried off the lizard (either the bird was intelligent or was greedy and took the larger piece!) Both the hunter and the hunted, having gone, I went closer to the tail that was still wriggling. It kept up for quite a long time, which I did not find so very interesting, because even in the most laziest human, the heart, eyes, liver and other organs stay alive for some hours after the death of the organism. Tired of watching, I went back to room. Almost an hour later, when I walked across the spot, the tail was still there. It had stopped moving. Curious as I was, I picked a twig and poked the tail and it started wriggling again. Now this was a surprise! When it stopped, I poked again and it moved again. This happened for sometime until, the tail was probably out of life!
The tail was sensitive to touch. I had always thought that the tail was programmed to wriggle randomly when dropped off. But no! To be sensitive to touch, it must be having a nervous system and a small localised brain to process the signals. The lizard is kind of an organism with out a mouth to feed, which is probably why it dies! This was another revelation to me.
Jade.
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