Endangered
Quince monitor
Varanus melinus
The quince monitor is a monitor lizards endemic to Indonesia.
Appearance
The quince monitor has a bright yellow head, legs, back and tail. The tail has alternating bands of yellow and black that get pale toward the last third. Its tongue is light pink in color with little variation.
This species can reach 80–120 cm (2.6–3.9 ft) in total length. A 20 year old male housed at the Cologne Zoo reached a total length of 129 cm, before suddenly dying of what was likely sepsis caused by an earlier bacterial infection.
Range and habitat
The quince monitor is likely endemic to the Sula Islands in Indonesia, but it reportedly may occur in Banggai. Initially it was reported to originate from the Obi Islands, but this was only an intermediate wildlife trade station. It is threatened by habitat loss and collection for the wildlife trade.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
In crisis
Quince monitor is 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 Quince monitor, Wikidata item Q2017238. 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.
