384 Kansas Academy of Science. 



NOTES ON THE GILA MONSTER {Heloderma suspectum). 



By Bernard B. Smyth, Topeka. 



EXHIBITING- a live Gila monster, Professor Smyth said, in 

 part: "This creature which I hold in my hand" (with a firm 

 grip back of the head) "is the northernmost species of the beaded 

 lizards {Heloderma), this being an inhabitant of southern Arizona 

 and northern Mexico, the other species (N. horridum) being a 

 denizen of the hotter regions of Mexica. Whatever may be said of 

 his Mexican brother, this one is a much maligned creature, on whose 

 shoulders the mantle of the ancient basilisk of two to three thou- 

 sand years ago has fallen, since the basilisk is shown to be an in- 

 nocuous creature. The tales formerly told of the basilisk are now 

 repeated concerning the Gila monster. If we are to believe all we 

 hear of this reptile, its bite is sure death; its breath is fatal to cat- 

 tle; its glance is certainly fatal; and when it bites it never lets go 

 till the moon sets. While this fellow in his wild state and on the 

 hot rocks and sands of his home is unquestionably to be avoided, 

 in captivity and in a cold climate he is one of the most inoffensive 

 and docile of creatures, the easiest to care for, and the cheapest 

 liver imaginable." (Here Professor Dyche came forward and opened 

 the reptile's mouth with his hands, showing that the creature had 

 no fangs, and asserting that in captivity, in a cold climate, and in 

 hibernation, like the rattlesnakes,.the Gila monsters are not provided 

 with poison.) "Its movements are sluggish; it requires no food to 

 keep its blood warm as animals do; the surplus food that it obtains 

 during the summer is converted into fat and stored up in the tail, 

 which becomes a storage organ for winter sustenance. Its claws, 

 as you see, are small and delicate, not intended for offensive move- 

 ments; and it has to depend for safety upon its colors and its 

 frightful reputation. 



"You all know, of course ( ?), that in its native home the favor- 

 ite food of the Gila monster is the Arizona tiger-beetle (Ambly- 

 chila picolominii) from the mountains of Arizona; but you 

 probably do not know (neither do I) that this insect is only obtain- 

 able at three o'clock in the morning of a rainy day when the moon 

 is dark and the sun is in Gemini or Cancer; that it takes just 

 twenty-five of the beetles to make a square meal for him; that the 

 quotations on this insect have all along been thirty dollars apiece, 

 until our dear lamented Doctor Snow, with his enterprising student 



