It’s like a bluebelly on steroids.  This was a female Texas Spiny Lizard (Sceloporus olivaceus).

From my photo blog:  PhoBloggery.com

Andrew Marshall of the University of York’s Environment Department, out on a monkey survey in the Magombera Forest in Tanzania, stumbled across a snake eating an unfamiliar looking lizard.

It turned out to be extremely unfamiliar.  This was, in fact, a whole new species of chameleon.

Meet Kinyongia magomberae (the Magombera chameleon).

Read more on Discovery News.

Yes, there is a lizard in this picture.  Amazing, no?

Unlike regular lizards, these have a round pancake-like body, and out the back of their heads sprouts a crown of horns. Their scaly, thorny skin has a mottled white and brown coloration, which makes them blend in with desert soil, and they have a big, soft white belly that’s speckled with tiny dots of black. All around the edge of their belly is a serrated row of soft little spikes, like a wiggly saw blade.

The most unusual thing about them is that they will squirt blood at you out of their eyes. This is absolutely true…

I remember the first time this happened, when I was catching a big one that was probably an alpha male. He struggled mightily in my little kid hands, and when he couldn’t get loose (and I suppose he figured I was about to eat him) he folded his eyes back and ejected two jets of stinky red blood. It startled me and I dropped him, and he played dead for a minute or two while I wiped the blood off onto my pant legs. Then he blinked a few times to clear the blood away, and ran off. When I caught him again he did the same thing, but a lot less blood came out, and this time I didn’t let him go.

Years later, in a junior high biology class, a teacher was telling the class that horny toads squirting blood from their eyes was a myth, and I raised my hand and told him that, no, it wasn’t, that I’d seen it several times. He was skeptical even after I told him the story, and finally I had to show him a passage about it from the Peterson’s Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians. I remember his only comment was, “I’ll be damned.”

I’ve always wanted to show my kids a real, live horny toad, but they’re pretty much extinct now except in isolates spots, and by the time I have grandkids they’ll probably have gone the way of their big cousins, the dinosaur.

From Tales of the Lizard Hunter
By Jerry J. Davis

Is this an awesome photo or what?  I wish I’d taken it, but I didn’t – this was snapped by Quinton Robinson.  I snatched it from Neatorama.com after they snatched it from National Geographic.

Amazing photo, Quinton!

“I’m sorry,” he said to the lizard. “It would have never worked.”

“I’ll change for you,” the lizard called out. “I swear I will!”

He shook his head, knowing she could never change. Her children perhaps, but not her.

From Flash Fiction by Jerry J. Davis

This lizard is, I think, a "5-Lined Skink" (Eumeces fasciatus).  I’ve seen one of those here in McKinney at the park.

Thank you for sending me these pictures, Delilah!

I do believe this is none other than a Broadhead Skink (Eumeces laticeps).

Easy.  Go down to Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park on Key Biscayne when the weather gets cold.  They rain from the trees, and lay dormant on the ground until the sun comes out and warms them up.

According to the Miami Herald, the locals aren’t too fond of the iguanas, complaining they munch the local hedges and gardens.  One commenter says, "If they are a pest why not cull them while they are laying around comatose?"

Dude, they’re lizards, not rats.  I’d fill a sack with them, take ‘em home, and start my own iguana ranch.