Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1984. / Typescript. Vita. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographies.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1990. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves [181]-228).

The lack of a comparative study between the Uta stansburiana of the Great Basin and Upper Colorado River Basin, and the fact that several reptile species have developed distinct populations in the Upper Colorado River Basin prompted this study. Twenty-one external characteristics of these lizards were compared, including several which had not been previously used in the separation of Uta stansburiana into subspecies. All of the statistical data were obtained from preserved specimens. Twelve of the twenty-one characteristics show significant differences between the Great Basin and Upper Colorado River Basin populations. The characteristics of back pattern and throat color show such complete distinction between the two populations as to indicate the need for the application of different names. The differences shown by the ratio of average lateral frontonasal length to median frontonasal length, number of dorsal scales, parietal size, and internasal size support this conclusion. The name proposed for the Upper Colorado River Basin population is Uta stansburiana uniformis.

Survival is a prerequisite for successful reproduction, and is thus intertwined with fitness. Some physiological systems can improve survival, like the immune system, but compete with other processes for resources. Because animals evolved with resource limitation, it is important to understand how these resource-allocation decisions are made. To meet this end, I performed four investigations addressing how life-history characteristics shift in side-blotched lizards (Uta stansburiana) using laboratory studies and multi-year field sampling. First, I measured metabolic rates in response to different immune challenges and different energy states in male lizards. I found that, surprisingly, cutaneous biopsies were associated with a downregulation of metabolic rate, lipopolysaccharide injection did not affect metabolic rate, and the fastest-healing individuals had the largest decrease in metabolic rate, regardless of feeding treatment. In my second experiment, female lizards were challenged with a cutaneous biopsy and follicle-stimulating hormone to force a trade-off between the reproductive and immune systems. I learned that follicle-stimulating hormone increased metabolic rates and cutaneous biopsies decreased them, and that a combination of both treatments reduced metabolic rate the most. In my third experiment, I sampled wild lizards from northern populations in eastern Oregon and southern populations in southern Utah. In the first year, longer-lived northern lizards had higher circulating corticosterone concentration, decreased reproductive investment, and increased microbiocidal ability, but the subsequent year did not hold to these trends. A subsequent common-garden experiment revealed that southern lizards were faster at healing cutaneous wounds, but lost much more body mass than the northern individuals, which healed more slowly but maintained body mass. Finally, I have conducted a 5-year field investigation addressing the life-history trade-offs associated with urbanization, which reveals interesting effects of precipitation on survival and reproductive effort at urban and rural sites.