Thread by @latimes

It’s hard to overstate the affection people in Oklahoma and Texas have for the horned lizard. They are mascots and the hallmark of childhood memories.

Which raises a question scientists now struggle to answer: why are they disappearing?

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The Texas horned lizard have virtually disappeared east of Interstate 35, which runs down the middle of Oklahoma and Texas, said Dean Williams, a Texas Christian University biology professor who runs the TCU Horny Toad Project.
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Classified as a threatened species in Texas and a species of greatest conservation need in Oklahoma, they have been dying off for at least 60 years. But pointing to the start and extent of their decline isn’t easy.

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“The problem, of course, is they used to be so common, probably one of the most common lizards in Texas,” Williams said. “People for the most part just ignored them. Nobody started monitoring them. When they just started disappearing, people were like, ‘Whoa! What’s happening?’”

Scientists point to two major invaders: humans and fire ants.

In Texas and Oklahoma, the combined human population grew fivefold over the last century, to 33 million today from 6.7 million in 1920.
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The lizards face yet another, more natural, problem: Just about anything that can eat a horny toad will eat a horny toad. Snakes. Coyotes. Hawks. Bobcats. Roadrunners. Raccoons. Rodents.

“These things are like popcorn in the environment,” Williams said.
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In recent years, scientists and zoos have tried a new approach to bringing the reptiles back from the brink: breeding them in captivity and reintroducing them to the wild. latimes.com/world-nation/s…

34 lizards whose eggs were collected at an air force base are being raised at the Oklahoma City Zoo as part of a study in which researchers monitor their growth, collect stool samples & study their gut bacteria to understand how human care affects them. latimes.com/world-nation/s…

Leslie Nossaman, recent president of the Austin-based Horned Lizard Conservation Society, gets wistful calls from people claiming they have the perfect property for horned lizards to be reintroduced.

Read the story by @haileybranson:

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