Short-term changes in air humidity and water availability weakly constrain thermoregulation in a dry-skinned ectotherm

Data sets and metadata of the paper "Short-term changes in air humidity and water availability weakly constrain thermoregulation in a dry-skinned ectotherm" by Le Galliard et al. Using experiments performed under controlled conditions in climatic chambers, we demonstrate that daytime thermal preferences of a ground-dwelling, actively foraging lizard (Zootoca vivipara) are significantly decreased by restriction in free-standing water availability. Air humidity during the day also influences body temperatures, but its effect is weaker than those of free standing water and depends on the time of day and the sex of the lizard. This confirms that the hydric environment leads to subtle but significant changes in thermoregulatory behaviors in lizards and further suggest that environmental humidity conditions are important methodological factors to consider in the analysis of thermal preferences.