70 Trans. Acad. Sci. of St. Lows 
availibility of food, and particular foods are:the leading 
factors in the lives of many animals.’’ Most lizards are 
predaceous and take live foods, and since that is true, 
it is evident that factors which influence the distribution 
of the prey of the lizard, more or less directly, influence 
its own distribution. It is evident that the problems 
arising in such a region are both extremely complex and 
interesting. 
Kennedy (1917), considering the general surface of 
the land, rather than its extremely varied texture, has 
written that ‘‘Topographically Kansas presents little 
that is not monotonous. The eastern third of the state 
is a region of low hills, and meandering, muddy streams. 
The western two-thirds is an upland plain. The surface 
of the state rises gradually from 800 feet elevation in 
eastern counties to 3600 feet in Greeley County on the 
extreme western border of the state.’’ The rise in eleva- 
tion in the eastern half of Kansas is only about 700 feet, 
whereas the rise in the western half of the state is over 
2000 feet. From this it is evident that Kansas is lower 
and flatter in the east than in the west. The topography 
of the eastern part of the state consists of rolling prairies 
broken frequently by wooded streams. Beginning at 
about the 1500 feet contour there is a rise to a treeless 
plein in the west. It is at this contour, theoretically, 
that the eastern and western regions meet. This is the 
place where the woods become sparser, and the rolling 
prairie extends onward. The above distributional maps 
show it to be a critical region in animal dispersal. 
Precipitation, according to the Weather Bureau, 
United States Department of Agriculture (1923) de- 
creases with remarkable uniformity from 42 inches in 
the southeastern counties to a little more than fifteen 
