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Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 2:22 pm
by ryan_mrtouchdown
I was told there were no known "Eastern" Blue Tongue Skinks in the U.S.? I believe I have an Eastern Blue Tongue Skink. :noknow:

Please someone help me out!

Here's a pic!

Sorry she just ate! lol

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 2:32 pm
by xxmonitorlizardxx
Their are a decent amount of Easterns just not a lot of them.
That looks like a Northern x IJ to me.
The colors on this pic are of can you get a better one?

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 4:09 pm
by Richard.C
Definatly has a northern look to it,possably has some ij influence to,but id say just northern,they are a subspecies of the eastern

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 6:05 pm
by Fatal_S
Welcome to the forum :) That'd be a Northern. Possibly a mix, but I don't see anything that screams that. More/better photos would help.

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 6:07 pm
by ryan_mrtouchdown
It was sold to me as an eastern and someone said it was an eastern. But they told me to come here to get a second opinion. :)

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 6:15 pm
by Fatal_S
Many skinks are mis-labelled as Easterns because that's the common blue tongue skink (as in that's what's it's called in Australia, where it's very common, it's a fairly uncommon species in the USA). I often see Indos and IJs labelled as Easterns too.

Looking up blue tongue skink gives the name Tiliqua Scincoides. That's a family of BTS, but usually that just gets used as the species. In that family are:
Tiliqua Scincoides scincoides (Eastern)
Tiliqua Scincoides intermedia (Northern)
Tiliqua Scincoides chimerea (Tanimbar)

There are other families too (Tiliqua Gigas, Tiliqua Rugosa, Tiliqua Nigrolutea, Tiliqua Multifasca etc). I'm missing some because I'm typing from memory. Anyways, point is there are lots of species, and they're all often labelled wrong by people who just don't know what the differences are.

Re: Eastern Blue tongue Skink. Is it rare in the U.S.?

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 7:52 pm
by critterguy
Looks like a Northern-I would say that this animal is somewhat suspect as a hybrid as the tail is pretty cleanly banded.