BLUE TONGUE SKINKS

i need some help iding my blue tongue skink ? love him more than anything. I am so so so happy i decided to make the journey.

i got this lil guy a couple of months ago now and hes the best thing ever. I have the best times with the little goober. But heres my problem. I was told that he is an indonesian blue tongue, I however dont think thats true. His markings and face and even scales are different. I asked on a forum on fb and they said irian jaya, but to me he has merauke or northern colors and markings as well. To be honest i just want to know what my beautiful bluey boy is. I have looked at scale classifications and by actual scales he is a t. evenscens. I was wondering what your takes are on it? please help, as i want to make sure he lives for *darn near ever. considering now my lil pup has another pup to love.

Need a better picture of the BTS, preferably of its back so we can see the colors and pattern. Some that have been keeping BTS long may he able to ID without a better picture though.

Definitely Indo, looks Merauke or IJ, more pics please!

I miss when my two were little and into everything .... adult bts are lovely and smoogy (well my two are) , but babies and juveniles are more fun to interact with.

ill have a better picture when i go to lunch. but ive visted a few sites and because (like i said before the scalation) is different on him than most, ive visted a few forums on facebook and of course coming back to my all time favorite forum is here, I wish everyone could experience these beautiful blueys, theyre truly eye opening lizards

also this is before shed, hes super dull right now. but god is he a sweetey:)

t. evenscens?

Mackdaddy,

I am not certain what your BTS is. It doesn't look like a Merauke to me. Perhaps IJ? I will see what the experts think. Where did you get it?

Definitely add some pictures here of your bluey, if you havent yet gotten an answer elsewhere.

I'm definitely not an expert, but I thought IJ as well.

@janella thank you!! and i got him from a guy on craigslist so an honest id is extemely hard for me, his scales on the side are different and his tail kind of has the look of a northerns . I question if maybe hes offspring of a hybrid pair? ive had no luck truly ideniftying him however. although his scales look like they should be coming off, like hes getting crinkly almost it looks like, and hes extremely pale. How long is an average wait time for shedding?? this is all new to me. id love some advice. thanks!

Hey Mackdaddy,

Your welcome. Your thoughts on him are exactly the same as mine. I thought Northern also and IJ. I hope the experts chime and we get a answer.

As for the shedding it should be any day now. Watch close and make sure he doesn't have any issues with the shed process. You can even provide a humid hide that will help.

We all are here to help, so if you have more questions this is the right place to ask.

Pictures please

I

Looks to be a nice example of an Irian Jaya. They are an indo species, but not the same as the one typically called the indonesian bts. IJs often can have very similar colour and patterns to both the Northern and/or the merauke, you will learn to discern the differences after looking at thousands of skink pictures hahaha.

I believe the IJ is in some cases called simply Tiliqua Sp but in other cases is lumped in with meraukes as Tiliqua gigas evanescens. Its generaly thought within the hobby that they are two seperate subspecies... i guess we are all just waiting around for some science guy to make it official.

Gosh i love this forum so much. and aw that makes me feel a little better. ive been doing an insane amount of research lately and that was the closed thing i could come up with, i wonder if hes a hybrid by chance. but i cannot wait for the experts to chime is as well, as this is the best forum out there best place to reach out for sure. how long does a normal shed take? a couple days? i just want to make sure hes perfect in his shed. I adore the lil goober. thanks!! (:

Yeah we are a pretty amazing group

As for shedding, a normal shed should only take 2-3 days.

That looks like an Indonesian.