Herp Aderpa the Jones Armadillo Lizard

Aja threatened to beat me up if I didn't start a thread about Herp! Just kidding, but she did encourage me to start one, so here it is.

Herp Aderpa is a Jones I've had for 6 years, and I have no idea what her real age is. She was my very first lizard--and the only one I have ever paid for--and I learned a lot by having her. She is a cutie pie and a little bugger to boot. Though she is somewhat skittish (handleable, but definitely not happy about it), she is quite fun to watch and has a number of funny behaviors.

She likes to jam herself in the smallest possible space she can fit, which is funny, but also a little bit dangerous at times. She's gotten stuck more than once. She also really enjoys jumping from her basking spot into her water dish, then running like a wet cat into her hide (I mean, that water did jump out and attack her!).

Lately I've been considering attempting to breed her, but I have reservations about breeding (it makes me super nervous), as I have never done it before.

Not sure what else to add (feel free to ask questions *cough* Aja *cough* ;b ), so I'll just add some pictures (which are in my album titled Herp Aderpa):

This is herp yoga. She discovered she could lock her foot onto the stick on thermometer and for the first two weeks I had her, she did this almost every day.
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She likes to be upside down when she's shedding. That log had been like that for almost a month, and she'd never climbed on the screen until she was shedding. I call it "skirt time" because it's the only time my scaly little girl looks like a lady, haha.
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Did I mention she can hover? Because she can totally hover. I caught her like this a lot. At first I thought she was stuck, but if you put your finger over her belly through the glass, she spazzes out and flees to the top of her basking spot, then jumps down and runs to the hide.
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Originally Posted by CentriRitanni

She also really enjoys jumping from her basking spot into her water dish, then running like a wet cat into her hide (I mean, that water did jump out and attack her!).

ha ha amazing! I love the unique behaviors we get to see in captivity!

She's too cool! What does she eat?

She's an insectivore. She is particularly fond of crickets, but she also enjoys dubias. She also eats waxworms, mealworms, kingworms, earthworms, and has eaten a pinkie runt (my friend gave me a bag of pinkies, and one was so tiny I decided to see if she would eat it, and she did, though it's the only one she's had). Some people claim they regularly feed pinkies to Jones, but I somehow doubt that, and even if it is true, she LOVES crickets (and most things that crawl or jump), so that's what she gets. She did eat the one adult dermestid I've had escape (it wasn't very smart... it went into her tank to try to eat her shed while I was cleaning, so she ate it), but I don't intend to ever feed those intentionally as they eat meat... only...

Originally Posted by CentriRitanni

She's an insectivore. She is particularly fond of crickets, but she also enjoys dubias. She also eats waxworms, mealworms, kingworms, earthworms, and has eaten a pinkie runt (my friend gave me a bag of pinkies, and one was so tiny I decided to see if she would eat it, and she did, though it's the only one she's had). Some people claim they regularly feed pinkies to Jones, but I somehow doubt that, and even if it is true, she LOVES crickets (and most things that crawl or jump), so that's what she gets. She did eat the one adult dermestid I've had escape (it wasn't very smart... it went into her tank to try to eat her shed while I was cleaning, so she ate it), but I don't intend to ever feed those intentionally as they eat meat... only...

What are they claimed to consume in the wild?

Well, that's where things get weird, because you can find a lot of mixed information. Some sources claim termites are their main source of food, others claim beetles, I found one that says scorpions and spiders... so, not really sure. None of the sources seem particularly more reputable than the others, so I'm not really sure who to discount. I can say, there is no way I'm putting termites or scorpions in any lizard's enclosure, so it's too bad so sad for that one.

I've also found sources that say they live in big groups (30-50) and others that say they are more solitary. When I got her, she was missing the end of her tail (a feeding accident), and was being housed in a 10 gallon aquarium with another female, but she's now in a 20 gallon by herself. Based on the number of people claiming groups compared to the number claiming solitary, I'm assuming them being social is probably more likely to be correct. I do think it's cool that they are ovoviviparous, which is part of the reason I'm considering breeding.

What sources have you read? Are these peer-reviewed primary sources?

That is too cool that she's ovoviviparous!

Yes and no. I have access to a number of abstracts regarding the armadillo lizard, but very few full articles, so using the authors name, I conduct searches and try to find a reference that is by the same person, but is available either to the public or able to be gotten from a library. Researching these guys is a bugger and a half. There is actually a journal article that discusses the possibility that the "Jones" are actually 2 separate groups, one that is solitary and one that isn't. I don't really buy into that much (it's the squirrels on each side of the canyon approach), simply because reptilian behavior tends to be innate. I did just conduct a new search and discovered 3 new sources since the last time I looked, one of which is an article discussing feeding habits, so I will definitely have to read that over (probably while not on opioids). With any luck I'll get that read through tomorrow and report back my findings. I was hoping I'd find one of breeding, but alas, no such luck. C'est la vie.

I can do a search at some point in the next few days if you would like. I have unlimited access to many full primary articles.

You are certainly welcome to do so if you wish, but I won't request it (merely because I know it is quite time consuming to read through some of these articles). I have database access through my university, which is where I get the articles I can... and a ton of abstracts.

I found an article about breeding (sort of)! It's actually about space used during breeding season, but it has some really interesting information in it:

Space use in a multi-male group of the group-living lizard
E. Effenberger & P. le F. N. Mouton
Herpetology Lab, Department of Botany & Zoology, University of Stellenbosch, Matieland , South Africa
Journal of Zoology, 2007, The Zoological Society of London

• "The space use of several females overlapped with the space use of two or more males. Males were observed to mate with one or more females, and one female was observed to mate with two different males on more than one occasion. Cordylus cataphractus males display typical territorial polygyny whereas females may be promiscuous...
  Eleven mating events were observed. With one exception, males were observed to mate with at least two females (Table 2). Out of the five females that were observed to mate, only one female was observed to mate with more than one male (Table 2)...
  The fact that certain females were observed to frequent areas used by different males and a female was also observed to mate with more than one male on more than one occasion (see Table 2) suggests that females probably readily mate with more than one male. Hence, female C. cataphractus may display polyandry, but because our observations were restricted to only 18 days during the mating period and only one female was observed to mate with more than one male, further investigation is needed to confirm this."

• "A home range is the entire area (space) within which an individual moves...
  Home ranges are considered important for mating success, as (1) the likelihood of a male mating with a female should decrease when the number of males whose home ranges overlap with that particular female increases and (2) a male’s mating success should increase when the number of females within his home range increases (Stamps, 1977; Rose, 1982)."

• "The armadillo lizard Cordylus cataphractus from South Africa, is one of the few lizard species permanently living in groups (Mouton et al., 1999). Groups normally consist of two to six individuals, but larger groups of up to 60 individuals are often encountered (Mouton et al., 1999; Visagie, 2001; Effenberger, 2004). Mouton et al. (1999) reported that groups of up to  10 individuals normally include only one adult male, but larger groups may include several adult males...the explicit composition of smaller groups, normally including only one adult male, suggest a mating system of territorial polygyny in the smaller groups (Mouton et al., 1999)."

• An interesting aside:
  "Living alongside C. cataphractus in the same crevice were two Cordylus polyzonus and three Chondrodactylus bibronii (gecko) individuals..."