Today's diary entry,comments, and earlier "New York Times" article omit an important fact.
According to the article and diary, three lizard species are dark skinned but at White Sands in New Mexico they "have evolved a white-skinned variety that makes them hard to find." This according to Erica Bree Rosenblum, a professor at the University of Idaho, who has spent the last decade studying the lizards.
But instead of "a great example of convergent evolution" could the unusual lizards be the result of atomic bomb testing that occurred in the region in the 1940's?
What did the lizards look like before the testing occurred?
It may be completely irrelevant but the question of genetic mutations caused by radiation needs to be raised.