Polychrus

Polychrus is the only extant genus of polychrotid lizards in the world.<ref name="itis1" /> Commonly called bush anoles, they are found in Central and South America, as well as nearby Trinidad and Tobago.

Polychrus means "many colored". True anoles in other genera are now placed in Dactyloidae. Polychrus is presently in the family Polychrotidae.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="itis1">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Species

File:Monkey Lizard - 49220531861.jpg

Polychrus gutturosus seen in Tapir Valley, Tenorio Volcano National Park, Costa Rica.

• Polychrus acutirostris – Brazilian bush anole Spix, 1825
• Polychrus auduboni – Many-colored bush anole Hallowell, 1845
• Polychrus femoralis – Werner's bush anole Werner, 1910
• Polychrus gutturosus – Berthold's bush anole Berthold, 1845
• Polychrus jacquelinae – Jacqueline's bush anole Koch, Venegas, Garcia-Bravo, and Böhme, 2011
• Polychrus liogaster – Boulenger's bush anole Boulenger, 1908
• Polychrus marmoratus – many-colored bush anole Linnaeus, 1758
• Polychrus peruvianus – Peruvian bush anole Noble, 1924

<ref>Polychrus, Reptile Database</ref>

Fossil history

Though species of Polychrus have an almost exclusively South American distribution today, a stem representative, Sauropithecoides charisticus, was reported from the late Eocene of North Dakota, USA.<ref>Smith, K.T. (2011) The evolution of mid-latitude faunas during the Eocene: Late Eocene lizards of the Medicine Pole Hills reconsidered. Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History 52: 3-105. https://doi.org/10.3374/014.052.0101</ref><ref>Smith, K.T. (2006) A diverse new assemblage of late Eocene squamates (Reptilia) from the Chadron Formation, North Dakota, U.S.A. Palaeontologia Electronica 9.2.5A.</ref>

Further reading

• Berthold, A. A. 1845. "Über verschiedene neue oder seltene Reptilien aus Neu-Granada und Crustaceen aus China". Nachr. Georg-Augustus-Univ. und königl. Ges. Wiss. Göttingen 3: 37-48.
• Boulenger, G. A. 1908. "Descriptions of new South American reptiles". Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., Ser. 8, 1 (1): 111−115.
• Koch, C., Venegas, P.J., Garcia-Bravo, A. & Böhme, W. 2011. "A new bush anole (Iguanidae: Polychrotinae: Polychrus) from the upper Marañon basin, Peru, with a redescription of Polychrus peruvianus (Noble, 1924) and additional information on P. gutturosus Berthold, 1845". ZooKeys 141: 79−107.
• Linnaeus, C. 1758. "Systema Naturae per Regna tria Naturae, secundum Classes, Ordines, Genera, Species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymus, locis. Ed. 10. Tomus I. – Salvius, Stockholm, 824 pp.
• Noble, G. K. 1924. "New lizards from northwestern Peru". Occasional Papers of the Boston Society of Natural History 5: 107−113.
• Schlüter, U. 2013. "Buntleguane - Lebensweise, Pflege, Fortpflanzung". KUS-Verlag, Rheinstetten, 78 pp. (A Monograph on Polychrus)
• Spix, J. B. von 1825. "Animalia nova sive species novae lacertarum,quas in itinere per Brasiliam annis MDCCCXVII-MDCCCXX jussu et auspiciis Maximiliani Josephi I. Bavariae regis". F. S. Hübschmann, München, pp. 1−26.
• Werner, F. 1910. "Über neue oder seltene Reptilien des Naturhistorischen Museums in Hamburg. II. Eidechsen". Mitt. Naturhist. Mus. Hamburg 27 (2): 1−46.