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Ancestor: Central Catland Micro Lizard

Size: Between 15 and 40 cm, depending on species.

Dietary Needs: Main foods are fish fry, crayfish larvae and baby snails. Out of season they also eat earthworms opportunistically and insects such as beetles and woodlice. Being so small, they also opportunistically scrape the last scraps of edible animal tissue off the bones of carcasses, scraps that larger animals don't consider worth spending energy trying to eat because they are so meagre.

Young lizards snap up flies and aquatic fly larvae. Flies on this planet are descendants of introduced midges and gnats, and most are still extremely small, hardly even a snack for an adult water zooter. However there are a few slightly larger fly species that an adult zooter will snap up.

Much like young zooters of larger species, small species of zooters tend to ingest more invertebrates than the larger ones.

Life Cycle: Reproduction is seasonal. Right from birth they hunt in the water, so the productive summer season brings plenty of prey. Winter is too cold in the South and too dry in the North. Males and females mate in late winter so that the females are ready to give birth in spring.

Their ancestors had returned to egg-laying, but this was a fairly recent development. It was easy for them to evolve back to ovoviviparity (hatching in their mother then being live-birthed), as was beneficial for an aquatic environment with little dry ground for eggs to be safe. These tiny water lizards can get quite heavily pregnant before birthing tens of tiny babies, most of which are unlikely to survive. These babies are independant and don't hang around their parent for long, as their parent can hardly do much to protect them (except in the care of the giant water zooter Aquazootoca gigas, who will protect their young for a few days until they disperse). Adult water zooters flee from danger, so the babies set out on their own and do the same when they encounter a threat.

Other: Their tail is flattened so that in the water when they swish it side-to-side it propels them with effective force. They also have webbed toes to give extra push during side-to-side undulation as well as when walking over muddy habitat.

Their eyes protrude slightly above the top of their skull, allowing them to rest at the top of the water with their eyes poking out. There is much danger outside of the water and this allows them to inconspicuously check for danger. They can also bask at the top of the water on warm days in still, non-flowing water, so they don't have to get out of the water to bask.