Tuatara
by Steve Taylor
Title
Tuatara
Artist
Steve Taylor
Medium
Photograph
Description
Tuatara are reptiles endemic to New Zealand. The two species of tuatara are the only surviving members of their order, which flourished around 200 million years ago.
Tuatara are greenish brown and gray, and measure up to 80 cm from head to tail-tip and weigh up to 1.3 kg with a spiny crest along the back, especially pronounced in males. Their dentition, in which two rows of teeth in the upper jaw overlap one row on the lower jaw, is unique among living species. They are even more unusual in having a pronounced photoreceptive eye, the "third eye", which is thought to be involved in setting circadian and seasonal cycles. They are able to hear, although no external ear is present, and have a number of unique features in their skeleton, some of them apparently evolutionarily retained from fish. Although tuatara are sometimes called "living fossils", recent anatomical work has shown that they have changed significantly since the Mesozoic era.
The name "tuatara" derives from the Māori language, and means "peaks on the back". "
The tuatara Sphenodon punctatus has been protected by law since 1895; the second species, S. guntheri, was not recognised until 1989 Tuatara, like many of New Zealand's native animals, are threatened by habitat loss and introduced predators, such as the Polynesian rat (Rattus exulans). They were extinct on the mainland, with the remaining populations confined to 32 offshore islands.
Uploaded
June 15th, 2015
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