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Reproduction occurs through parthenogenesis, with up to four unfertilized eggs being laid in mid summer, and hatching approximately eight weeks later. The New Mexico whiptail lizard is a crossbreed of a western whiptail, which lives in the desert, and the little striped whiptail, which favors grasslands. The whiptail engages in mating behavior ...
The asexual, all-female whiptail species Aspidoscelis neomexicanus (center), which reproduces via parthenogenesis, is shown flanked by two sexual species having males, A. inornatus (left) and A. tigris (right), which naturally hybridized to form A. neomexicanus.
Parthenogenesis has been studied extensively in the New Mexico whiptail in the genus Aspidoscelis of which 15 species reproduce exclusively by parthenogenesis. These lizards live in the dry and sometimes harsh climate of the southwestern United States and northern Mexico.
About one third of whiptail lizards are parthenogenic, which is asexual reproduction by development from an ovum without fertilization, essentially cloning, but with strategies to create diversities. This is not the case with Western Mexico Whiptail lizard, which is a bisexual species. [16]
Asexual reproduction is a type of reproduction that does not involve the fusion of gametes or change in the number of ... The New Mexico whiptail is another example.
Parthenogenesis is a mode of asexual reproduction in which offspring are produced by females without the genetic contribution of a male. Among all the sexual vertebrates, the only examples of true parthenogenesis, in which all-female populations reproduce without the involvement of males, are found in squamate reptiles (snakes and lizards). [1]
The desert grassland whiptail is mostly found in the deserts of southern to central Arizona and along the Rio Grande river in New Mexico. It is also found in the deserts of northern Mexico. A. uniparens is commonly found in low valleys, grasslands, and slight slopes. Some have argued that the species' range is expanding due to overgrazing.
Aspidoscelis mexicanus (W. Peters, 1869) – Mexican whiptail; Aspidoscelis motaguae (Sackett, 1941) – giant whiptail; Aspidoscelis neomexicanus (Lowe & Zweifel, 1952) – New Mexico whiptail; Aspidoscelis neotesselatus (Walker, Cordes & H.L. Taylor, 1997) – Colorado checkered whiptail, triploid checkered whiptail