SOME REPTILES OF SOUTH AMERICA

GREEN ANACONDA

Eunectes murinus (derived from the Greek Ευνήκτης meaning "good swimmer" and the Latin murinus, "of mice" for supposedly preying on mice, not for being "gray mouse-colored") is a nonvenomous boa species found in South America. It is the heaviest known snake species. The term anaconda (without further qualification) often refers to this species, though the term could also apply to other members of the genus Eunectes.

ORICONO COCODRILE

The Orinoco crocodile (Crocodylus intermedius), is a critically endangered crocodile. Its population is very small, estimated at only 547 in the wild and it can only be found in freshwater environments in Colombia and Venezuela of northern South America, in particular the Orinoco River and its tributaries. Extensively hunted for their skins in the 19th and 20th centuries, this species is one of the most critically endangered species of extant crocodiles. Males have been reported up to 6.6 m in the past but such sizes do not exist today, 5.2 m being a more widely accepted maximum size. Males average at 4.1 m in length weighing 380 kg, while females are slightly smaller averaging at 225 kg. Sexual dimorphism isn't as profound as in some other species. The coloration is light even in adults.

The biology of the Orinoco crocodile is poorly documented in the wild, mostly due its small population. It is thought to have a more piscivorous diet with an opportunistic nature resulting in a generalist predatory behavior. The Orinoco crocodile is and apex predator and will take the opportunity to prey on a variety of reptiles, birds and mammals, including caimans on occasion. The prey base is mostly made up of large predatory fish, challenging the general view by the locals complaining about the crocodile hunting local fish to very low numbers.

SPECTACLED CAIMAN

The spectacled caiman (Caiman crocodilus), also known as the white caiman or common caiman, is a crocodilian reptile found in much of Central and South America. It lives in a range of lowland wetland and riverine habitat types and can tolerate salt water as well as fresh; due in part to this adaptability it is the most common of all crocodilian species.

MARINE IGUANA

The marine iguana (Amblyrhynchus cristatus) is an iguana found only on the Galápagos Islands that has the ability, unique among modern lizards, to live and forage in the sea, making it a marine reptile. The iguana can dive over 9 m (30 ft) into the water. It has spread to all the islands in the archipelago, and is sometimes called the Galápagos marine iguana. It mainly lives on the rocky Galápagos shore, but can also be spotted in marshes and mangrove beaches.

 

GALAPAGOS TORTOISE

The Galápagos tortoise or Galápagos giant tortoise (Chelonoidis nigra) is the largest living species of tortoise, reaching weights of over 400 kg and lengths of over 1.8 meters. With life spans in the wild of over 100 years, it is one of the longest-lived vertebrates. A captive individual lived at least 170 years.

The tortoise is native to seven of the Galápagos Islands, a volcanic archipelago about 1,000 km west of the Ecuadorian mainland. Spanish explorers, who discovered the islands in the 16th century, named them after the Spanish galápago, meaning tortoise.

Tortoise numbers declined from over 250,000 in the 16th century to a low of around 3,000 in the 1970s. This decline was caused by exploitation of the species for meat and oil, habitat clearance for agriculture, and introduction of non-native animals to the islands, such as rats, goats, and pigs. Ten subspecies of the original fifteen survive in the wild; an eleventh subspecies (C. n. abingdoni) had only a single known living individual, kept in captivity and nicknamed Lonesome George until his death in June 2012.