Learn what differentiates tuataras from lizards and why their biology and reproduction is so unusual.
These New Zealand creatures have been carving their own evolutionary path for nearly 250 million years. The species they evolved from split off from the group that also gave rise to lizards and eventually snakes.
Rhynchocephalia were wiped out around the planet by the Cretaceous — tuataras are the only surviving member, and they only survived in New Zealand. A male will wrap his hind legs around the female’s tail in what biologist Sarah Lamar from the University of Wellington and her colleaguesLamar’s team research has found that perhaps to make for differences in reproduction tactics, tuatara sperm is among the fastest swimmers of any reptile known. That’s the end of the speediness though — their eggs, once laid, take between 12 and 15 months to hatch. They also take a long time to mature — 15 to 20 years.
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