Ophisaurus attenuatus

The slender glass lizard (Ophisaurus attenuatus) is a legless lizard in the family Anguidae. The species is endemic to the United States. Two subspecies are recognized. The lizard was originally believed to be a subspecies of Ophisaurus ventralis. Their name comes from their easily broken tail which they can break off themselves without ever being touched. It is difficult to find a specimen with an undamaged tail. The lizard eats a variety of insects and small animals, including smaller lizards. Snakes and other animals are known to prey on the species. They are vulnerable or endangered in some states due to humans destroying their environment and killing their food supply with insecticides. Slender glass lizards have yellow to brown bodies with six stripes and they have a middorsal stripe. White specks on the middle of the lizard's scales may sometimes form light stripes. O. attenuatus can attain a total length of 22 to 36 inches. The species is closely related to collared lizards. Its tail comprises two-thirds of its body length. Its scales are supported by an osteoderm which makes the body hard and stiff. The species has a pointed snout and a non-distinct head. Males and females are of similar size. Its markings may fade as an individual ages. Unlike snakes, they have eyelids and ears. Slender glass lizards have some difficulty moving across smooth surfaces because they do not have the large belly-plates and related muscles of snakes. The body of a snake is more flexible than that of this species and have different shaped scales. Similar to snakes, the species will hibernate in a hibernaculum. Slender glass lizards are primarily diurnal and they can move fast. If captured, a specimen may thrash vigorously, causing part of the tail to fall off in one or more pieces. While a potential predator is distracted by the wiggling tail, the lizard quickly escapes. They sleep in burrows borrowed from other animals and they will use those burrows to hibernate. The species is active during the day when the weather is cool, but is only active during dawn and dusk when the temperature is hot. When a predator breaks off part of its tail, the tail never completely grows back which causes its tail to become shorter each time that it is attacked. They are known as slender glass lizards because their tail can be broken easily. The species can snap off their tail without it being touched and the partial tail that regenerates is tan, but it does not have the pattern of the original tail. The pieces of tail will continue to move once broken off. A myth is that the pieces of broken tail can grow into new lizards. In a 1989 study, 79% of the specimens in the population area had broken tails. It is hard to find a slender glass lizard that has its entire tail. They seldom bite when they are threatened. When they are approached, the lizard will sometimes stay still and try to blend in with the vegetation. The western slender glass lizard reaches an average of 26 inches long. It can be found in woods or dry rocky hillsides, in grass or the burrows of small mammals. The species can easily camouflage itself in tall grass because of its color. The males are larger than females with a longer head and tail. Males have more scales above their lateral fold and along the center of their back than females. Larger males have waxy white crossbars on their dorsum's anterior, which have an outline of black and are not present in smaller males and females. In the word Ophisaurus, orphis is Greek for serpent or reptile and sarous means lizard or reptile. The word attenuatus is Latin for 'tapered, drawn out, thin'.