A new chameleon

 

A new chameleon species may be the world’s tiniest reptile

Hidden beneath the leaf litter of a northern Malagasy forest lives a chameleon so slight that it could tumble off the tip of your finger. Measuring just under 30 millimeters from snout to tail, the newly described species, Brookesia nana, may be the smallest reptile on Earth, researchers report January 28 in Scientific Reports.

Just two adult specimens, a male and female, are known. The female measures 28.9 millimeters, considerably larger than the 21.6-millimeter-long male. The size difference may have driven the male’s genitalia to be quite large — nearly 20 percent of its body length — to be a better fit to his mate, herpetologist Frank Glaw of the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology in Munich and colleagues suggest.


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