• All reptiles are amniotes, which means that they lay eggs resistant to drying up (unlike amphibians).
• As amniotes also includes mammals and birds, we can define reptile as any amniote without the distinctive characteristics of mammals and birds, such as feathers, milk production, or the control of their own temperature.
• Reptiles also developed a waterproof skin, in many cases reinforced by scales.
• Reptiles can live in almost every environment, as vegetarians, predators, land dwellers, tree climbers, swimmers, and even flyers.
• Nevertheless, the ones that decided to return to the water, remained air breathers, holding their breath to dive.
• Synapsids and therapsids or "mammal-like reptiles", were the first to experiment with mechanisms of heating control.
• Dimetrodon, for example, used its sail, full of blood vessels, to catch energy from the sun and thus to warm up its blood.

Gharial; photo by Knilob cc-by	Chameleon; photo by Uniteddiversity cc-by	Rat Snake ; photo by USFWS/southeast cc-by

Sources:

-The Variety of Life, Colin Tudge, 2000

Citation: García, A.I. 2015. The Tree Of Nature (Online) at http://thetreeofnature.com

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