MORPHOLOGICAL VARIATION IN THE LACERTID GALLOTIA-SIMONYI-MACHADOI ANDA COMPARISON WITH THE EXTINCT GALLOTIA-SIMONYI-SIMONYI FROM EL-HIERRO(CANARY-ISLANDS)

Morphological variation was investigated in 56 live adult specimens (3 1 male, 25 female) and ten dead near-hatching embryos of G. simonyi ma chadoi from the ''Centro de Reproduccion e Investigacion del lagarto g igante del Hierro'' (Frontera, El Hierro). Dimensions, scalation and t eeth traits were measured and quantified. Males and females differed s ignificantly (multivariate analysis of variance) in most of these trai ts, with values for males being greater than those for females. All tr aits significantly increased with SVL at a greater rate in males than in females, except for body weight, where no significant difference wa s found. A qualitative comparison between data from G. s. machadoi and those for ten G. s. simonyi showed that for most biometric traits, ra nges overlapped for the two subspecies, but mean and maximum values we re higher in G. s. simonyi. Hind limb length increased at a greater ra te relative to SVL in G. s. simonyi than in G. s. machadoi.