Data analysis

For each glide trajectory, we used the 3D position data of the five body points to calculate the roll, pitch, yaw, AoA, percentage camber, and the dihedral angle of the lizard at each instant of time for the complete glide (Fig. 2; also see Fig. ^S7a–f). Furthermore, the instantaneous acceleration along with the mass and the in-flight airfoil surface area of the individual were used to calculate the instantaneous values of C_L and C_D (also see Fig. ^S7g–i). However, the aerodynamic data analysis excluded the takeoff phase (t_takeoff = 0.43 ± 0.02 s, x_takeoff = 0.80 ± 0.08 m, mean ± sd, n = 14) and the glide trajectory just before touchdown (last 0.07 s of each glide, x = 5.32 ± 0.04 m) because the lizard patagium was typically seen to be opening or closing during those intervals. Nonetheless, our analysis covers ~ 82% of the complete glide of the lizard.