Karoo dwarf chameleon no means closely related. Rather, the Karoo dwarf chameleon belongs to a group of mostly short-tailed drab "Bradypodion" species which mostly inhabit semiarid to arid habitats. Its closest living relatives among these appear to be the peculiar and nearly extinct Smith's dwarf chameleon from mountainous habitat, and especially the southern dwarf chameleon. The Karoo dwarf chameleon may actually be a subspecies of the latter; there appears to be significant gene flow between the two. Karoo dwarf chameleon The Karoo dwarf chameleon ("Bradypodion karrooicum") is a chameleon native to South Africa. It is about 14 cm (6 in) long, mostly colored
Karoo the mountains, but are very secretive, so are rarely seen. Many of the animals that formerly inhabited the Karoo in large numbers, including lions, have been reintroduced to the area in nature reserves and game farms. As in the Great Karoo, antelope and other big game inhabited the Little Karoo in the past. However, the dominant zebra was not the quagga, but the Cape mountain zebra, ("Equus zebra zebra") which is adapted for life on rugged, mountainous terrain. Their hooves are harder and faster-growing than those of Burchell’s zebra ("Equus quagga burchellii"), which lives on the plains. The two species