The Houston Zoo has welcomed five eyelash vipers, its first Hosmer's spiny-tailed skink birth, and returning star tortoises, alongside new Henkel's leaf-tailed geckos. The vipers are born with working fangs and venom. The animals are now on view in a specially designed habitat in the zoo's Reptile and Amphibian House, near the reticulated pythons.
According to abc13.com, the zoo welcomed the birth of five eyelash vipers, each one born with fully functional fangs and venom from the moment it entered the world. The outlet also confirms that the Hosmer's spiny-tailed skink birth marked a first-ever birth for the Houston Zoo. As Chron reports, those skinks give birth to live young and are native to northern Queensland and the Northern Territory of Australia near the Gulf of Carpentaria, where they live in small colonies among rocky outcrops and grow to about 9 inches long.
A Snake Born Ready to Bite
The Eyelash Palm Pitviper is ovoviviparous: the female retains fertilized eggs inside her body until the young are developed, according to the Smithsonian's National Zoo. The young are born live, with fangs and venom already present, the Chronicle reports. The snake's name refers to the modified scales above its eyes; adults may be yellow, green or pinkish and have a triangular head, according to the Smithsonian.
Eyelash vipers can reach about 2.5 feet long and range from southern Mexico through Central America into parts of Colombia, Ecuador and western Venezuela, where they favor vegetation in humid forests, the Chronicle reports. The Houston births follow a successful breeding at the Dallas Zoo: six baby eyelash pit vipers were born there on Oct. 11, 2024, the zoo's first successful birth of the species since 2014, according to the Dallas Morning News.
Madagascar's Masters of Disguise Join the Family
The zoo's new Henkel's leaf-tailed geckos resulted from pairings recommended through the Association of Zoos and Aquariums' Species Survival Plan, the station's report notes. These nocturnal climbers are found only in Madagascar, use flattened, leaf-like tails to blend into their surroundings, and have enormous eyes adapted for low-light conditions; because they cannot blink, they clean their eyes with their tongues instead, per Chron's account. The species faces ongoing threats from deforestation on Madagascar, and the Smithsonian's National Zoo adds that their highly variable patterns perfectly mimic different types of bark and lichen, letting them vanish against tree trunks while they hunt small invertebrates at night.
The Association of Zoos and Aquariums says nearly 300 Species Survival Plan programs use population records and breeding and transfer plans to support healthy, genetically diverse populations in zoos and aquariums, according to the AZA. A separate program at Lincoln Park Zoo illustrates the coordinated breeding effort: a Henkel's leaf-tailed gecko hatched after 107 days in an incubator kept at 74 degrees, weighing 2 grams. The hatch was among nine births recommended under that species' plan over an 18-month period, the Lincoln Park Zoo reports.
Captive breeding and wild conservation
The Henkel's leaf-tailed gecko pairings described above are part of a Species Survival Plan. As the AZA explains in the program information cited above, SSPs manage animal populations in zoos and aquariums; its separate SAFE programs are aimed at conservation impact in the wild. The Houston Zoo's births are not described as a planned release into the wild. Other projects have connected captive breeding with releases: in a separate Puerto Rican crested-toad effort, more than 300 toads were born via in vitro, and 200 were planned for release in Puerto Rico that December, the Associated Press reported on Nov. 22, 2019. For Indian star tortoises, Mongabay reported that illegal collection for international wildlife trade was the biggest threat to wild populations, followed by habitat loss for farmland; that context does not establish that the Houston Zoo's tortoise arrivals address those threats. (Associated Press; Mongabay.)
Tortoises Make a Comeback, Skinks Dig In
Baby star tortoises have returned to public view at the Houston Zoo after not being present there in recent years, the report notes. Their shells carry yellow or light-brown lines radiating across a dark background, with the pattern shifting as the animals grow; hatchlings measure roughly 5 inches and adults can reach about 14 inches, Chron reports. The species lives in hot, dry scrublands across parts of India and Pakistan and on Sri Lanka.
Hosmer's spiny-tailed skinks use rocky crevices for protection, wedging themselves in and inflating their bodies; ridged scales and tail spines can make them difficult to dislodge, according to the Chronicle. The geckos, skinks, tortoises and vipers are now on view together in the purpose-built habitat, offering visitors a look at animals with different adaptations and breeding histories.
