Indian or Bengal Monitor Varanus bengalensis FACT FILE: Local Name: Goa (Urdu) Family: VARIANIDAE Genus: Varanus Status: Common Warning: This lizard inflicts a powerful bite with its long, strong and sharp teeth   Photo Credit: Daniel Bennett (www.mampam.com)   Description and Biology: General characteristics:  This large varanid has a snout-vent length 815-900 mm, tail 1230 mm.   The dorsum is olive to brown, with dark spottings. Ventrum yellowish, with or without dark spottings, especially under the neck.   Biology: Essentially a burrower, it is also a good tree climber. During rainy season it lives in tree holes feeding on birds and eggs, otherwise it burrows in hard soil. It often climbs into thatched houses to feed on nesting birds. In its burrow it wedges itself in by inflating its body and fixing its claws to the walls so that it is difficult to pull it out. It is a good runner and swimmer, it may remain submerged for a considerable time. When foraging at its leisure, it moves sinuously through the undergrowth, frequently flickering its tongue, looking for any moving object. It has a wide range of food items: arthropods, larvae, worms, frogs, lizards, snakes, birds, and mammals. It is known to munch on carrion and killed mammals. When alarmed, it stands still and tries to slip away unnoticed, however, when cornered, it defends itself by  hissing loudly, it elevates and arches its body toward the intruder, and lunges and lashes its tail from side to side. It inflicts a powerful bite with its long, strong and sharp teeth.   Breeding activity is observed from April to June.  Rival males wrestle to win over territories. Usually 6-12 leathery eggs averaging size of 29 x 15 mm in size and, weighing 20-30 eggs are laid in burrows.   Habitat, Distribution and Status: The name of this monitor lizard is misleading, for it is one of the most widely distributed of the living varanids. The Bengal  monitor inhabits river valleys in eastern Iran, Afghanistan and western Pakistan (Mertens 1942, 1959; Leviton & Anderson 1970; Luxmoore & Groombridge 1990). Elsewhere in Pakistan it is widespread in many different habitats, but reaches greatest abundance in agricultural areas (Auffenberg et al 1991). This large varanid  frequents moderately dry  forests, and extends into cultivated areas, where  it  inhabits tracts of barren badland. It often invades inhabited houses, attracted by poultry and rodents.   Varanus bengalensis has been recorded from Assam, Burma, Nepal, Sikkim, throughout India, and Sri Lanka. In Pakistan,  it is reported  from  throughout  the plains  of Punjab and Sindh, sub-Himalayan tracts, Waziristan and extends westward into southeastern Iran and eastern Afghanistan.   For many years Bengal monitors have been collected on a large scale for their meat and skins. Their skins is highly prized, particularly the dark skins of specimens from Bengal. When commercial trade in the species was outlawed by CITES in 1975 many countries ignored the ban. Ten years later Japan was still importing hundreds of thousands of skins from Bangladesh, Pakistan Thailand and Malaysia (Luxmoore & Groombridge 1990).       Credits: Dr. Muhammad Sharif Khan, Herpetological Lab Rabwah, Pakistan Daniel Bennett (www.mampam.com) Nausherwan Ahmed ©1997-2002 Wildlife of Pakistan-All Rights Reserved.