According to National Geographic News, a hitherto unknown species of lizard - called Leiolepis ngovantrii - has been discovered at a Vietnam restaurant. Scientists are of the opinion that the new lizard species reproduced through the process of cloning rather than mating.

A number of lizards - entirely female - of the Leiolepis ngovantrii species were first discovered by a Vietnamese scientist names Ngo Van Tri, who entered a rural restaurant for a meal. Van Tri was surprised to notice that all the lizards - which were trapped in the restaurant tank, from where they were served to the customers - were exactly similar in appearance.

Van Tri clicked pictures of these lizards and sent them to L. Lee Grismer, a herpetologist at La Sierra University in Riverside, California, and his son Jesse, who is a PhD student. Identifying the lizards to be belonging to Leiolepis genus; and considering them to be a new species, Grismer and his son decided to fly to Ho Chi Minh City to examine the lizards and talk to the restaurant owner.

Noting that the Leiolepis is an all-female lizard species, Grismer said that barely one percent of these lizards are able to reproduce on their own by cloning (parthenogenesis).

Further adding that "the Vietnamese have been eating these for time on end," Grismer said: "In this part of the Mekong Delta (in southeastern Vietnam), restaurants have been serving this undescribed species, and we just stumbled across it!"