When Darwin visited Isabela Island in the Galapagos archipelago in 1835, he did not reach the Lobo volcano. That is why he could not see any specimen of the unique species of pink-colored land iguanas that a team of Italian and Ecuadorian researchers have just discovered. The animal belongs to the genus Conolophus and its most striking feature is color, which at the time was attributed to depigmentation. However, its genes have revealed that it is a unique lizard, as explained by scientists in the latest issue of the journal PNAS.
The new species is pinkish in color with black spots, and can reach a length of up to 1.80 meters between body and tail. Unlike other land lizards, their crest does not end in spikes.
DNA analysis places the date of the differentiation between the new pink iguana and the rest of its Galapagan companions at approximately 5.7 million years ago. The surprising thing is that at that time none of the western islands of the archipelago existed, including Isabela, where he lives today. Although the current population size has not yet been determined, it is estimated to be small, as only 36 pink iguanas have been captured for research so far.
With 13 main islands and 17 islets in the Pacific Ocean, the archipelago of the Galápagos Islands that so amazed Charles Darwin was the first UNESCO World Heritage Site three decades ago.
