Crappy iPhone pic

[Ellie_A]

He's so pretty!

[Katrina]

Kat just needs to send him to Jeff's place...he has some special ionizer in the air or something that forces skinks to eat like mad! I take them back and they won't eat the EXACT same thing they were eating at his place like it was going out of style!!!

Many males I have had just won't bulk up appearance wise, but they are usually just fine in the "weight" department and plenty healthy...

This guy came from Jeff - Jeff had the same issues, he won't bulk up! He's grown a lot - he was 240 grams when I got him. But he is really tiny for an adult Merauke. He's added a lot of length in the last year. He was a few years old and 242 grams when he came to me, I tried my best with fuzzies, dew worms, all sorts of stuff. Now I just feed him weekly meals like the rest of the bunch. Before:
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=19908&p=391568#p391568

Today:

IMG_1874.JPG

I'm not too worried. He's obviously healthy and fine. At least now he seems like he could breed, before he was too tiny! But if Meraukes breed, Rollie will likely be the daddy so this guy hasn't had a chance yet and hasn't shown interest in procreation.

He's a looker, but his personality is just unreal. A really incredible little bluey.

[jasjmm27]

With Meraukes, it seems that they carry a lot of their weight in their "chin"...you can see here that he is rockin' a double chin...I believe I have seen this in various Indo's and Meraukes...

[Jeff]

Just a little background on this guy. I acquired him when he was likely less than 2 months old. He was the size of a newborn gigas. I bought him from an online "dealer", who undoubtedly bought him from an importer. I'm fairly sure this guy was born to a WC mother after she was collected from the wild, but before she was passed on from the importer or exporter, to the dealer.

Some people may remember the thread I made when this little guy arrived. He came in the middle of winter and was shipped in totally inappropriate packaging. When I received him, he was upside down in the box, and I thought he was dead. He appeared to be frozen solid. I sat and held him in front of the heater vents in my car and rubbed him for quite awhile before he started to move.

He always seemed fine after that, but he was always small and skinny. The thing is, meraukes vary in size more than any other BTS I have seen. It is not unusual at all for some to be this small and for others to be 26" long or more. There is really no way of knowing if this guy's growth was stunted, or if he was always destined to be a small skink.

[Katrina]

He doesn't really have a jowl - just extra skin around there. He isn't super skinny but he certainly isn't carrying extra weight (unlike some of my Meraukes!).

He seems to be very slowly and steadily growing - he wasn't skinny when he came from Jeff either, just small. Seems to be a very slow grower and probably will always be a very small skink. He's an interesting little guy and an incredible personality. So glad he survived, I remember Jeff telling me about the frozen little baby skink. So lucky that Jeff waited in out and tried to revive him long enough, I'm sure others may have assumed he was dead and not tried to warm him.