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In fact, ants make up 90% of the diet of many horned lizard species. Although harvester ants are venomous insects, somehow their venom doesn’t affect horned lizards .
Keeping track of the position of the sun, the ants are able to navigate, always knowing the direct route back to their nest, thus can minimize their time spent in the heat. [6] A few scouts keep watch and alert the colony when ant-eating lizards take shelter in their burrows. Then the whole colony, hundreds of ants, leaves to search for food ...
Juvenile Iberian green woodpecker eating ants. Myrmecophagy is found in several land-dwelling vertebrate taxa, including reptiles and amphibians (horned lizards and blind snakes, narrow-mouthed toads of the family Microhylidae and poison frogs of the Dendrobatidae), a number of New World bird species (Antbirds, Antthrushes, Antpittas, flicker of genus Colaptes), and multiple mammalian groups ...
Although eastern fence lizards are an ant specialist, invasive imported red fire ants can pose a risk to young, smaller-bodied juveniles if they consume them, especially because young fence lizards are more common consumers of ants than adults. [36] Ants compose up to 80% of a juvenile's diet. [37]
Phrynosoma species do not eat fire ants. Fire ants kill many species of wildlife, and are fierce competitors against the native ants, which horned lizards require for food (with their specialized nutritional content). Fire ants have given all ants a bad reputation, and human attempts to eradicate ants, including invasive species and the native ...
The flat-tailed horned lizard occurs in areas of fine sand, while the short-horned lizard (P. douglasii) is found in shortgrass prairie all the way up into spruce-fir forest. The most common species in the Arizona Upland subdivision is the regal horned lizard ( P. solare ), which frequents rocky or gravelly habitats of arid to semiarid plains ...
Ants may form a prominent part of the diet of some lizards, particularly among the lacertas. [6] [42] Horned lizards are also well known for specializing on ants. Due to their small size and indigestible chitin, ants must be consumed in large amounts, and ant-eating lizards have larger stomachs than even herbivorous ones. [44]
Mountain short-horned lizard (Phrynosoma hernandesi), Culberson County, Texas, USA (19 May 2018) The greater short-horned lizard is a "sit-and-wait" predator. It feeds primarily on ants, but also takes an occasional grasshopper or beetle. Often, it can be found sitting in the vicinity of a nest or trails.