Talk about burning up with love. Researchers found that one specific species of lizard is able to increase its body temperature during mating season as it's out looking for love.
It was previously believed that lizards, which are cold-blooded reptiles known as ectotherms, warm themselves up by using the heat from their environment. However, researchers from Brazil and Canada found that one species of lizard, the Argentinean black and white tegu, has the ability to heat itself for several months.
The tegu soaks itself in the sun to warm up during the day and hides in burrows at nighttime to avoid getting cold. Since the temperature inside their burrows is naturally colder since it is night, their body temperature too decreases — but not when they're in heat.
During the study, published in the journal Science Advances, Professor Glenn Tattersall, a biologist from Brock University in Ontario, and his team of researchers, took away food and sun from some of the tegu lizards, finding that they were still able to keep their bodies warm. They came to the conclusion that the tegu is able to raise its own body temperature up to 18 degrees Fahrenheit warmer during September to December, the months of its mating season.
This could be because warmer bodies aid in successful reproduction, and heat can also help incubate their eggs when in their burrows. Females were found to have the highest body temperatures.
They found that the lizards' body temperatures were warmest when they left their burrows in the morning, which is the time they mate.
The researchers believe that the lizards are able to increase their body temperature because of a hormone that is secreted. This can also be contributed to increased metabolism, as well as increased heart and breathing rates.
The findings can help shed light to what causes our own body temperatures to increase.
Source: Phys.org
Photo: Jax Strong | Flickr
