The most miserable pregnant lizard in the world

A lizard species in Australia may be the most miserable. Due to the limitations of the body structure, the animal must contain a pregnancy that is one third the size of an adult, but the belly does not protrude at all. This feat is equivalent to a woman giving birth to a 7-year-old baby!

"I don't think this animal has such a big pregnancy," said Suzy Munns, a researcher at James Cook University. Munns is investigating how these rafting lizards - probably nearly 40 centimeters - survived pregnancy so hard.

As the largest member of the short-legged lizard family, raft lizards only give birth to one child at a time, averaging 35% of the body weight. The pregnancy lies so much above the lungs and the mother's digestive system that, during the last pregnancy, the mother cannot move or eat much.

Meanwhile, the mother's abdomen cannot hatch due to the solid scales covering most of its body.

X-ray images showed that the mother's lizard's lungs were compressed, even collapsed in some places, due to the pressure of the fetus. My mother cannot breathe deeply, and this is why it is often motionless. At the end of pregnancy, lizards lend themselves slowly between the darkness and the light, but it is difficult to escape the enemy.

(Photo: James Cook University)

Munns said animals use a lot of strategies in breeding. Some lay a lot of eggs or babies, and most die before they mature. Others, like raft lizards, have few children but are large.

"Lizard is the case of 'dropping all eggs into a basket' - investing a lot in the child, but the chances of survival of the offspring are also great, due to its size and independence at birth. " , Munns said.

T. An