Vol. 8 No. 1 (2013)
Short Note

Polydactyly in the Tyrrhenian wall lizard (<em>Podarcis tiliguerta</em>)

Antigoni Kaliontzopoulou
CIBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos
Daniele Salvi
CIBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos
Verónica Gomes
CIBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos
João Maia
1 CIBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos, Campus Agrário de Vairão, 4485-661, Vairão, Portugal 2 Departamento de Biologia, Faculdade de Ciências, Universidade do Porto, Rua do Campo Alegre FC4 4169-007 Porto, Portugal 3 Institut de Biologia Evolutiva (CSIC-UPF), Passeig Marítim de la Barceloneta, 37-49, 08003, Barcelona, Spain
Panagiotis Kaliontzopoulos
Florinis 54, Vrilissia, Greece

Published 2013-07-03

How to Cite

Kaliontzopoulou, A., Salvi, D., Gomes, V., Maia, J., & Kaliontzopoulos, P. (2013). Polydactyly in the Tyrrhenian wall lizard (<em>Podarcis tiliguerta</em>). Acta Herpetologica, 8(1), 75–78. https://doi.org/10.13128/Acta_Herpetol-11805

Abstract

Polydactyly is a fairly frequent phenomenon in tetrapod populations, but it is relatively rare in reptiles. Here we report the occurrence of polydactyly in a random sample of the Tyrrhenian wall lizard (Podarcis tiliguerta) from Sardinia. In the locality of Siniscola (NE Sardinia), we found two polydactylous female lizards, one of which showed polydactyly in one and the other in both hind limbs. This observation constitutes, to the best of our knowledge, the highest frequency of polydactyly ever reported in a single lizard population (4.54%). While providing a direct explanation for polydactyly is complicated, the genetic data available show that the two polydactylous individuals are not direct siblings, excluding the hypothesis of direct maternal inheritance of this condition.

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