The Nature Blog

photo credit: Cheloran ©

The common lizard is the UK’s most widely spread lizard and possibly the most commonly seen reptile of all in Britain. Like all lizards it needs the warmth of the sun in order to get going and so a walk early in the morning on a sunny day gives you a great chance to see them.

However lizards are wary and quick-moving so you need to tread carefully if you want to get a better view than simply a brown tail disappearing into the undergrowth! But take your time and get a close look and you will find that the common lizard is really a tremendously pretty creature.

Appearance

The viviparous lizard (Lacerta vivipara) is not a large lizard by any stretch of the imagination and including the tail may only grow to around 12-15cm though many species seen are a lot smaller. As the name suggests these lizards typically give birth to live young rather than laying eggs so one may see portly female in the summer and soon afterwards tiny baby lizards.

The common lizard is a basic brown colour with a reasonably blunt head though some specimens may be seen with a variety of darker mottling and speckling on them. If you see a lizard in the wild in Britain it is *almost* certain to be the common lizard.

Habitat

Common lizards were once widespread and I remember seeing them as a child simply running around people’s gardens in the height of summer. As with all other creatures though habitat loss and the building of roads has reduced the places in which you may see these creatures.

Common lizards may be found in grassland and meadows, basking on walls in summer, on sand dunes but the most likely place to see them in my experience is on heathland. Find your local heath with it’s unique habitat and walk slowly and quietly on a summers day for the best possible chance of seeing this amazing creature.

Food

The common lizard like most other lizards is carnivorous and will eat virtually anything it can get in it’s mouth. Due to the small size of this lizard this typically means invertebrates of which grasshoppers are possibly the most common given the habitat and time of year that common lizards are at their most active.

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photo credit: raneko

Like many animals, common frogs exist in a range of different colour forms. Typically green or brown in colour, one also may see bright yellow/green versions and also some orange/red specimens.

Nobody seems totally sure whether this is due to genetic variations or differences in habitat or diet but I think the picture above illustrates the point well where a red female can be seen mating with a more standard coloured male.

Note that according to Froglife, the conservation charity, red frogs are not too unusual and some females reportedly *turn* red during the breeding season for whatever reason.

Red Common Frog Seen In Scotland Recently

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photo credit: Shandchem

The common frog (Rana temporaria) is one of Britain’s few native amphibians and generations of children have collected frogspawn – the fogs egg masses – in order to watch the resulting tadpoles hatch and grow in miniature versions of the adult frogs known as froglets.

However as Britain’s wildlife comes under ever more strain due to the expansion of the human population, plus a reduction in suitable habitats it is advisable now to merely enjoy frogs from a distance rather than capture them for captive observation.

Appearance

The common frog is an easy species to identify by it’s moist, slimy-looking skin and long back legs. The common frog varies quite a bit in size though 8-10cm is a normal body length for them. The colour of adults can vary considerably though it is typically either a mossy green or a brown color, often with dark mottling over the base colour.

The only aspect of identification which can cause confusion is telling the difference between frogs and toads. Toads typically have a drier, more warty skin. Toads are more likely to crawl rather than jump as a mode of transport, are often darker in colour and have a large parotid (poison) gland behind the eye which can be seen in the form of a sizable lump.

Habitat

As amphibians frogs favour cool, damp environments. Whilst they are most commonly seen in the spring months while breeding in still water such as garden ponds, they actually spend most of the rest of the year out of water, typically using plant cover to try and hide from potential predators which may include herons, foxes and a number of smaller birds of prey.

The ideal habitat to attract frogs into your garden is an area of water such as a pond surrounded with dense plants to provide cover. It should also be easy to get into and back out of the pond and so a small ramp in the form of a thick tree branch or a rock is also a worthwhile addition.

Food

Common frogs are carnivorous and will eat virtually anything they can get into their mouths. Examples of prey items may include ants, caterpillars and even some smaller beetles.

Interesting Facts

Frogs typically hibernate during the winter months in the UK and northern Europe. They typically emerge in early spring and begin to breed in March. To breed, the male frog grasps the female in a position known as “amplexus”. So if you see two frogs in this embrace, the male is typically ontop with the female beneath him.

The large masses of eggs in a jelly coating, known as frogspawn, may be seen in standing water. Where a pond has been recently removed, female frogs may even try to lay eggs on the bare ground where the pond used to be and this could be quickly and gently moved into the nearest pond to prevent the eggs from perishing.

Once they hatch, the tadpoles will eat virtually anything they can fit in their mouths from smaller siblings up to pond weed and algae. They can be fed on crumbled fish food and shredded lettuce if brought indoors though care must be taken that the water does not foul.

Frogs will often try to return to their original hatching pond in order to spawn so removed ponds can cause a real problem, as can road casualties caused by frogs crossing busy roads to find a suitable spawning site.

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photo credit: Lincolnian (Brian)

All the evidence suggests that spring is well and truly on it’s way. After a particularly harsh winter with weeks and weeks of snow, it seems like the weather has changed over the last week or so and nature is reacting swiftly.

Blue skies and bright sunshine are causing plants to leap into growth and the animals too are making moves. Frog spawn is being laid right now in ponds across the UK and even our native reptiles are being seen for the first time this year.

Twitter is alive with tales of lizards and snakes being seen so as a real reptile fan (and living near a fantastic heath right now) I shall be heading out hoping for my own first glimpse in the next few days.

If you’d like to help to track the coming on spring (and autumn) then you could do a lot worse than getting involved with the Woodland Trust’s Natures Calendar project.

Sights which we should see this month all being well include summer migrants arriving back (such as the chiff-chaff), daffodils coming into flower and potentially sites of our first butterflies such as the Brimstone.

Let me know what signs of spring you’re seeing on your part of the world…

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