lillianniccum's Journal

This assignment was a fun one for me because I have always known that there is wildlife in my backyard and my neighborhood, but I have not appreciated some of it. This gave me the chance to walk around my yard and just look at the nature. I took pictures of bugs or plants that were out of the ordinary and not landscaped into my yard. I even got a couple pictures of a lizard. Sadly, I did not get to see any of the really cool things like a snake or a coyote, but those only come around sometimes. The observations that I made were of things that I see in my yard on a regular basis. I think a place of low diversity is inside my actual house; we have screens and windows and doors, and we do not really keep plants or anything inside. There is the occasional small spider or fly, but nothing like there is outside. I found places of high diversity to be around the perimeter of our yard where we have the most plants and soil.

https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41180734
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41173357
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41180666
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41180943
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41493927
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/41494301

P.S. When I made my observations, I added them to the NatGeo project, but they did not add for some reason, so I am not really sure how that works. On the page, it says observations can only be contributed by certain people.

I observed an Ornate Tree Lizard that I found along my back yard fence. I noticed that these lizards run very fast along the fence when they are approached, which made me think about two things: they are hard to photograph and I have no idea how I caught them when I was younger. This lizard spent most of my observation time perching on either the side or the top of the fence. back flat with hear sticking up in the air, sitting in the sun. Once the lizard poked at a leaf, not sure if it was to eat or not. Mostly, if perched on the fence and pushed its front legs up and down (similar to a push up motion) while sitting in the sun, or moving to a new location.

Function: Lizards are coldblooded reptiles, and spend time sunning themselves to increase their body heat.
Causation: I think the sun would be the stimuli for the lizard.
Development: I am inclined to think that this is an instinctual behavior because it is so prevalent against reptiles, perhaps those that do not sun are those that do not survive.
My explanation for evolutionary history is similar to that of development, I cannot think of something that would distinguish the two.