Ctenophorus


Ctenophorus, from Ancient Greek κτείς, meaning "comb", and φόρος, meaning "bearing", is a genus of lizards, commonly known as comb-bearing dragons, found in Australia. They are in the dragon lizard family, known as Agamidae.

Description

The genus contains the most diverse group of dragon lizards in Australia. It is the largest group of Australian lizards and it has an extensive radiation in the arid zones. Many of the species of Ctenophorus have been grouped by a similar morphology. The informal names and groupings within this genus — rock dragon, sand dragon, crevice-dragon, ground dragon, and bicycle-dragon — are named after the mythological creature, the dragon.
Lizards in the genus Ctenophorus may be confused with lizards in the genera Tympanocryptis and Diporiphora.

Species

There were 34 recognised species in the genus until a new study published in June 2023 discovered four more in South Australia adding up to a total of 38 species. The new species are included in the list below.
Danielle Edwards, curator of terrestrial vertebrates at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, and Mark Hutchinson, of the South Australian Museum, both started studying sand dragons in 2008, when only three species had been identified. Their June 2023 study published in the Journal of Herpetology provided additional morphological data from all of candidate species, which led to the recognition of 11 species. Of these, four taxa were found to be species rather than subspecies, with another four species newly described.
The four new species, all endemic to the state of South Australia, have been assigned names relating to their respective Aboriginal language of their habitat:
Lizards of the genus Ctenophorus are known to display colour polymorphism, more than one colour type being found within a population. It is believed that colour polymorphism in this group has evolved as a result of a combination of sexual selection and natural selection.