Critically Endangered
Cyclura pinguis
Cyclura pinguis
Cyclura pinguis is a lizard or snake in the family Iguanidae, recorded as Critically Endangered.
The lizard or snake
Cyclura pinguis is a lizard or snake in the family Iguanidae.
Range and habitat
Anegada Island is rare in that it is not a volcanic island, but formed from coral and limestone providing many caves and natural burrows for the iguanas to live. Animals typically inhabit a single burrow and it was once observed that they appeared to bond for life, dwelling in burrows in close proximity to their mate. As the drive to find more females and compete for food has increased their range, this does not appear to be occurring any longer.
The species can be found exclusively in the islands of Anegada and Guana. Historically, it inhabited the islands of Puerto Rico and Saint Thomas. Even so, the animal's original range has been greatly diminished over prehistory.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet
Like all Cyclura species the Anegada ground iguana is primarily herbivorous, consuming leaves, flowers and fruits from different plant species. This has also caused them to become opportunistic carnivores preying upon centipedes, millipedes, roaches, insects, and other invertebrates as opposed to being strict herbivores.
In crisis
In the 1980s, eight iguanas were moved from Anegada to Guana Island, British Virgin Islands, to start a second population in part of the species' former range. Both zoos have actively been working with the British Virgin Islands on a joint-recovery program started in 1997 on Anegeda Island. 120 iguanas have been raised at the facility for release into the wild.
Cyclura pinguis is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Cyclura pinguis, Wikidata item Q305588. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
