Science News shows off a critter from Madagascar that is very small, yet enormously cute. You have to see this. Click the link to meet Brookesia nana, a newly discovered chameleon that might be the world’s smallest reptile:
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.
Dubbed B. nana for its nano size, the species belongs to a genus of at least 13 other small chameleons spread out across the mountainous forests of northern Madagascar. Why B. nana and its cousins shrank to such minuscule proportions remains a mystery, though smallness does have its benefits: There’s some evidence that small chameleons are especially good shots with their ballistic tongues.