In the sun, the thorny devil’s coloration is a broken pattern of burnt red, yellow and brown. However, the vibrant colors become drab when the thorny devil is cold or alarmed.

 The thorny devil is one of the most unusual looking reptiles. If this lizard is threatened, it can tuck its head between its legs and show a “false head” on its back. If a predator tried to eat this head, it would only damage the knob not the real head.

This lizard is found throughout most of the arid interior of Australia, particularly on sandy, rather than stony, soils. It lives on parts of the western and southern coasts of Australia.

They eat ants, nothing but ants, preferably one particular kind of ant – a small black ant. They have chisel-like teeth to feed on the insects.

No small Australian ant is safe from the Thorny Devil. They can eat a large number of ants in a single meal. They eat about 600 to 3,000 ants, but they only eat one ant at a time with their sticky tongue. They can eat up to 45 ants in one minute. Now that’s a fast tongue.

The Thorny Devil’s predators are mainly the bustards and goannas. Goannas or monitor lizards can also dig up the eggs of the thorny devils. Wild cats are a threat to this lizard too. The worst threat of all is humans. It is always … Habitat destruction….. Habitat destruction… Habitat destruction!!

One big advantage of having so many horns is that it makes them a very difficult meal to swallow. This is useful because some of their predators, like foxes, coyotes, bobcats or even faster snakes are too fast to outrun.

animals/lizards/lizard_horned_squirtingblood.html Use this website to see a video showing the “Blood Squirting” technique of the Thorny Devil Lizard: