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Project Noah Nature School
Nannoscincus maccoyi
Approximately 160mm long, dark metallic almost black on top and slightly paler underneath, very short limbs each with five toes, these skinks are fairly common in our longer grasses which seems to be their domain of choice. The tail is about as long as the body and quite thick. This one looks like it has lost its tail at some stage. They move with a very flexible wriggling action - somewhat like a snake so I guess the legs are only partly useful.
Urban fringe grasslands.
This one is temporarily contained for photos as they move so fast. http://morwellnp.pangaean.net/cgi-bin/sh...
Spotted on Apr 5, 2012
Submitted on Jun 5, 2012
2 Comments
Thanks martinl. That's a great link for our local skinks.
I'm fairly sure this one didn't have the yellow underneath. There are 3 common species on our block (not counting the transient Tiliquas). This one is always in the grass, the usual garden greyish ones are in our timber or stone retaining walls, and the pink ones living underground in damp places... http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/806...
I'll just have to allocate some serious skink search time. Need a break from fungi anyway.
I've found a good link for you http://museumvictoria.com.au/bioinformat... Yours' tiny legs seems to fit it in the burrowing skinks category. The closest fit in my opinion is the same as mine. I don't know if yours has a yellow belly, or if the color is limited to only one gender. http://morwellnp.pangaean.net/cgi-bin/sh...