This is the Bearded Anole, Anolis pogus, which is found only on St. Martin. I have an amusing story of how this anole got its beard.
The biologist Skip Lazell was in St. Martin in 1963 and 1966 as a graduate student, studying and collecting these lizards. Shortly afterwards, he described it as a new subspecies (later it became its own species). At the time, he was discussing whether scientific names needed to have some kind of meaning with colleagues at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology. (Often scientific names are descriptive, octopunctata means eight-spotted, or in tribute to someone, Alsophis rijgersmaei is named after Hendrick van Rijgersmai who collected the type specimens.)
Skip’s position was that scientific names did not need to have a meaning, so he named our lizard pogus after his favorite cartoon character, Pogo the Possum. Skip didn’t explain the story of the name when he published his article naming the lizard, and according to him, no one ever asked him about it until I did in 2012.
In the meantime, later researchers, seeking to find meaning in the name pogus, conjectured that it was from the Greek for beard, pogos. They even went so far as to give it the common name Bearded Anole based on this misinterpretation. Of course, the lizard has no beard.
So, today we have a lizard that lives nowhere else on earth, which has two meaningless names.
I want to thank the recent backers of my book project: Alyssa Elser, John F. Wupper, Tom, Courtney Wynn Sheets, Heather Conley, Henry and Diane Mayo, Kathleen P Pope, Patrick Bennett, Tommy Widenflycht
The project is well-funded on Kickstarter now, but if you haven’t supported it yet, I have two reasons why you might want to do so. First, even at just $5 you will be thanked in the book. I would love to have lots of names to print in my thank you section because it shows that people support this project. You may want to be there to show your support as an individual and a representative of your community. Second, if you want the book itself, rewards including the actual book start at $30 and include limited edition, autographed prints of photos from the book. It is a great deal if you think you might want the book anyway.
Check it out and help me get to 100 backers before the project ends in three days, only 21 more backers needed:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/420840503/the-incomplete-guide-to-the-wildlife-of-saint-mart
