The Real-Life Dragon You've Probably Never Heard Of

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What if dragons were real?

In this minisode of Wildly Curious, Katy Reiss and Laura Fawks Lapole explore one of the strangest reptiles on Earth: the Armadillo Girdled Lizard (Ouroborus cataphractus), a tiny armored lizard from South Africa that looks like it crawled straight out of a fantasy novel. 

Covered in spiky scales and equipped with one of the most unusual defense strategies in the animal kingdom, this reptile doesn't run from danger. Instead, it grabs its own tail and curls into a living ball of armor. 

In this episode:

🐉 Why this lizard is often called a real-life dragon
 🦎 The bizarre defense strategy that inspired its scientific name
 🌍 Where Armadillo Girdled Lizards live in South Africa
 🛡️ How armor, behavior, and social living help them survive predators
 👶 Why these reptiles give birth to live young instead of laying eggs
 🏜️ How evolution shaped one of the world's most unique lizards

If you love reptiles, wildlife, weird animal adaptations, dragons, natural history, or bizarre creatures from around the world, this episode is for you.

🎧 Part of our ongoing Animals You've Probably Never Heard Of minisode series.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Alright guys, this is another episode of Hopefully Animals You've Never Heard of. Hopefully. So Laura went two weeks ago and talked about her Patouille bird, the poisonous bird. I am gonna talk about I mean, this animal is kind of cool. It's a lizard. I wanna say it's kind of cool because it there's not a lot of whole uniqueness about it, but you need to look it up because it is so I I've never seen it or heard of it, but it is so freak freaking adorable. It's called the Armadillo Girded Lizard. Please. Oh, it sounds cute. No, Google it. You have no idea.

SPEAKER_01 0:34

The cutest lizard I've ever seen is a crocodile skink. I have yet to top it, but I'm looking this up. The armadillo what? Armadillo what? A girda girdled G-I-R-D-L-E-D. Oh yes! I think I have seen these. These are super cute.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

They are really cute.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

I would I is Are they related to a Euromastics?

SPEAKER_00 0:54

I don't know. I would assume so just because of how it looks. Similar. But for people wondering and have no idea what I'm talking about, it basically looks like the literal definition of a 3D printed dragon.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

Just like a lot like the crocodile skate. It's even just the same kind of plates.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

Yeah, yeah. To the point where I was like Googling stuff and I was like, Yeah, no, right? I was like, is this all this freaking AI crap now? I had to look it up more. Alright, so this lizard is native to South Africa, specifically around along rocky desert-like areas on the western side of the country. And it's not spread out everywhere. You tend to find it in very specific habitats where there's, of course, a lot of rocks, a lot of crevices and places to hide. Because if you look at the color of it, it's like the I don't know, it looks like dirt. Like the color, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:41

You'd be like, that is a desert lizard. Or like a scrub desert, scrub lizard.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

It clearly, clearly blends in. Scientifically, it's called the Auroborus Catafracus. Close enough, which is Roboris is right.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

You're right on that one.

SPEAKER_00 1:56

Oh, sweet. I was. Yeah, well, that means it comes from the idea of an animal biting on its own tail, which is exactly. Yep. Yeah. Yep. And that's exactly what this does. It's physically, it's small, it's only around six to eight inches long. But it's so small. It is so so small. But it's it's it is way more intense than what something that size should be, just because of how armored it is and the bite and everything.

SPEAKER_01 2:19

It's so spiky.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

Yep. And it's covered in those thick overlapping scales that form almost an armor-like plating. They're not really smooth, they're sharp, rigid, and strictly built for defense, which, whenever you're six to eight inches long, that's in the desert you have to be. So, but it really does look like that.

SPEAKER_01 2:37

Like it looks like if you tried to eat it, it would not feel good in your mouth.

SPEAKER_00 2:40

At all, at all. And it looks like a tiny dragon. Like if somebody saw this out and about, I would be like, that's this has got to grow up to be a dragon. Yeah, this is this has got to be a baby dragon. So, again, like we were talking about, the thing that makes us stand out the most is the defense strategy. When it feels threatened, it doesn't run away. It grabs its own tail into its mouth, and everything I was reading says it curls into a tight ball. That is you used very loosely because I did not see one picture of it curling into a tight ball. It's more like a donut. Yeah, it's a yeah, it's a it's a it's a scaly donut.

SPEAKER_01 3:14

If you wanted a lizard ring, this is for you.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Yeah, right? It's so freaking cute. But yeah, it definitely doesn't crawl curl up into a tight ball at all. It's it's a it's a donut. But once it does that, all those armored spiky scales are facing outwards. So instead of a soft-bodied animal on you know the belly and everything that you could grab onto, you've basically turned yourself or at the dragon's turned it dragon. Good grief. The lizard's turned itself into a ball of spikes, essentially.

SPEAKER_01 3:39

And it's one caltrup.

SPEAKER_00 3:41

Yeah, right. And it's how fast can it do it? I don't I would. I would assume so.

SPEAKER_01 3:47

I would whip that tail into its mouth and correct.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

I mean, I would assume it would be quick. I wouldn't be like, uh you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like normal lizard cast. You know. I I would assume not that quick. I mean like an armadillo pace, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 4:01

Yeah, but they're like freakishly filled. All you gotta do is like the tail in the mouth seems complicated, but maybe they just curl up and then eventually get it in its mouth.

SPEAKER_00 4:10

That's what she said. But but you do see behaviors like this in like tailbugs, armadillos, and but for a reptile, it like this is fairly unique. Like there's not a ton of other reptiles that curl up this way.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

Especially not with his little tail in its mouth. It's so tail in his mouth.

SPEAKER_00 4:30

Yeah, right. So that and that, but that's not the only unique thing about then of this lizard. They actually live in colonies, which is also not something that you typically see a whole lot in reptiles. You'll find them in groups sharing the same rocket areas, which adds another layer of protection, more eyes, more awareness, more chances to avoid a threat before it gets too close. And then there's one more, like one more little detail I'm gonna go over that makes them a little different, is that they give live birth. So as we know, most reptiles lay eggs. Yeah, but also owl. I guess if they come out head first, it would be. But I'm assuming too, like most babies, like the scales are like you know what I mean, like softer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Almost like how babies' bones are like soft, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 5:15

Or like horses' hooves, terrifying. If you want to look up something gr crazy, yep. New world horse hooves.

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Ugh. Uh uh. Uh so gross. So yeah, so unlike most reptile eggs, these guys retain the embryos and give birth to fully formed young lizards. So even the reproduction strategy is a little more specialized than what you would expect of it just being like a typical, typical lizard. So again, this is one of those animals where everything about it is kind of built on survival in some place that you wouldn't expect there to be like a ton of predators all the time, but there's enough around there that it's everything it's done between the armor, the behavior, the social structure it has, it's not always like fine. That they said it's not the fastest one as far as running. So I'm guessing that's how it adapted to like curl up in a ball. Right.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

It's gotta do something else.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

Yeah, it's instead of it being like, you know what, I'm gonna be faster. It's like, you know what, let's just not. Let's just evolve. Yeah, let's just evolve to be spiky, and I'm just gonna curl up. But yeah, but that might be one of the like the closest animals that I've ever seen to a real life dragon. And I had never seen I'd never seen it before that was so freaking cute. So that is my first one, the spiked donut. Alrighty, guys. So next week we'll talk, we'll do another long episode, and then we'll continue on with these mini episodes throughout the rest of the season. Go check us out on Patreon and support us if you can and visit us on social media. And until next week.

unknown 6:44

Aye.