Species
Eastern glass lizard
Ophisaurus ventralis
A legless lizard that looks like a snake but has eyelids, ear openings and a tail that shatters.
Photo Kristof Zyskowski (opens in a new tab) / iNaturalist, CC BY 4.0 (opens in a new tab)
At a glance
- Size
- About 45 to 108 cm long, most of it tail
- Habitat
- Pine flatwoods, wet meadows, grassy fields and dunes
- Diet
- Insects, spiders, snails and small lizards
- In Georgia
- The Coastal Plain
- Rabies vector
- No
Identification
- Key marks
- Long and legless; green to tan above with dark lines; a groove along each side; eyelids and ear openings
- Told apart from
- Snakes, which have no eyelids or ear openings and no side groove
- Told apart from
- Slender glass lizard, which is striped below the side groove too
- Where to look
- In grassy, open places; sometimes crossing roads
Behaviour
Glass lizards are lizards without legs. When grabbed, the long tail can break into pieces that twitch while the lizard escapes, and a new, shorter tail grows back. They move stiffly compared with snakes.
Why they matter
They eat many insects and small animals in grasslands and pine flatwoods, and they are food for hawks and snakes. They are often killed in mistake for snakes.
Reproduction and lifecycle
Eggs — Usually 8 to 17
Nest — Under logs or in soil, guarded by the female
Incubation — About 8 weeks
Hatchlings — About 12 cm long
Maturity — In three or four years
Lifespan — Over ten years
Living around people
- A glass lizard is harmless; if it must be moved, it can be guided with a broom into long grass.
Misconceptions
- A glass snake can break into pieces and join itself back together. The broken tail does not rejoin; the lizard grows a new one.
- It is a snake. It has eyelids and ear openings, which no snake has.
Related species
Seasonal activity
When this species is breeding, and when there are nests on the ground. Mowing during the shaded months is how most nests are found.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Breeding | Jan: no | Feb: no | Mar: no | Apr: no | May: no | Jun: no | Jul: no | Aug: no | Sep: no | Oct: no | Nov: no | Dec: no |
| Active nests | Jan: no | Feb: no | Mar: no | Apr: no | May: no | Jun: no | Jul: no | Aug: no | Sep: no | Oct: no | Nov: no | Dec: no |
| Notes | Sheltering | Sheltering | Emerging | Active | Breeding | Females guarding eggs | Guarding eggs | Hatching | Young active | Active | Sheltering | Sheltering |
Where it lives
Recorded in 8 states and provinces. Each one links to the other animals there, and to the rehabilitators licensed for them.
If you found one
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