31st Annual Student Research Conference
Variation in Body Size of Collared Lizards (Crotaphytus collaris)
Kelly A. Lovera* and Tanner D. Bandy
Dr. Chad Montgomery, Faculty Mentor
Body size is an important component of life history that is correlated with many traits related to survival and reproduction. Reptiles, being ectothermic, are constrained by environmental conditions, particularly temperature. The Collared lizard (Crotaphytus collaris) ranges widely across the western United States south into Mexico. Across the range, populations experience significantly different climatic regimes that can influence life history.Therefore, we examined geographic variation in body size in C. collaris at three localities from southeastern Colorado south to southwestern Texas. At the site of capture we recorded location, sex, and seven morphological characters. We used principal component analysis to reduce the variables and used regression to examine the relationship between each of the first two PC scores and latitude. We will be supplementing our capture data with museum specimens to have a continuous representation of the species across its range
Keywords: reptiles, environment, Collared Lizard, Life History, Geographic Variation, Principal Component Analysis
Topic(s):Biology
Presentation Type: Poster
Session: 3-5
Location: GEO - SUB
Time: 3:30