Non-invasive lizard identification using signature curves

Abstract

A novel non-invasive method is proposed to help identify the endangered Pygmy Bluetongue Lizard. This would be preferable to the commonly used, invasive, toe-clipping method, which could be unreliable if the lizard was to lose a toe or foot naturally. Each lizard has a unique and permanent scale pattern which can be used to identify individual lizards. The proposed method involves a novel technique to derive a signature curve from the Hough transform output of the lizard scale pattern such that the signature curve is scale and shift invariant. It has been found that a lizard can be successfully identified by comparing its signature curve with those signature curves of all registered lizards stored in a database