The Endemic Herpetofauna of the Cockpit Country includes the
following:
Two Eleutherodactylus frog species (E. griphus and
E. sisyphodemus) are endemic to the Cockpit Country
and appear restricted to areas of heavy leaf litter in the
minimally disturbed forest NW of Quick Step, Trelawny. With
snout-vent lengths of 18mm, both represent the smallest hylid frogs
on Jamaica.
Three lizards of the Cockpit Country (including two local
endemics) are highly specialized and found rarely anywhere else
than in bromeliads. Two of the species belong to the genus of the
polly lizards, Sphaerodactylus oxyrhinus, and S.
semasiops. Both species grow to a snout-vent-length of slightly
over 30 mm. Sphaerodactylus oxyrhinus (also found in NE
Jamaica) is very a colourful lizard with a bluish head, yellowish
body mottled with brown, orange tail, and bright yellow eyes. S.
semasiops (CC-endemic) has a pair of prominent eyespots on the
middle of the back. The "eye" has a white "pupil" and a black
"iris" edged with yellow. It may serve to startle and frightening
off potential predators. The third of the Cockpit bromeliad lizards
is a galliwasp of about 10 cm SVL, Celestus fowleri. The
animal appears to be very rare. It was described in 1971 from a
single specimen captured at Windsor, and it has since been seen but
one more time, close to the original site. Very recently, signs of
a much larger bromeliad galliwasp, which might occupy bromeliads
high in the canopy, have been located in the interior of the
Cockpit Country (R. Diesel, pers. comm.). Details of life history
are scant for these species.
