Herptile Spotlight #2: The Schneider’s Gold Skink

Today, we have our first guest author….yaaiiii give a big applause to aunt Lara Inglis \(^^)/

Copyright belongs to Lara Inglis

She is going to introduce  us with The Schneider’s Gold Skink, cool name eh!

But…First, I want to introduce our kind guest author

Aunt Lara has A LOT of herptiles and very well-educated about her herptiles. Mommy learns a lot from her. We are expecting her to be our guest author for more than once….please be our regular guest author aunt Lara 🙂

You can check her amazing art of photography in her Deviantart Account. She is incredibly talented, mommy often jealous over her shots.

You can also get to know her better in her twitter account and her facebook account (go to her account by clicking on  these profile pictures of her below)

Without more delay, let’s let aunt Lara do the talking:

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Copyright belongs to Lara Inglis

The Schneider’s Gold Skink, or Orange-tailed Skink is an active day time species however it also likes to spend a lot of time burrowed under sand or other substrate that you may have in its tank.  They are personable and can quickly learn to like being handled.  However because they are active they don’t usually spend much time just sitting still if they are out so you need to make sure they don’t hurt themselves if they try to venture off of your arm onto a near by piece of furniture. 

They are native to North Africa and South West Asia but a fairly easy to get as pet in some areas outside of their home range.  They also reach length of 14-16 ½ in (36-42 cm) so if you are going to keep one you should have at proper sized tank to house it.  They do need artificial heating and lighting to keep them healthy if you want to own one.  I use a full spectrum UV bulb that I keep on mine for at least 12 hours a day.  Plus for heat I use a metal clamp lamp and a 85 watt reptile day heat light during the day for also 12 hours.  At night that day light is switched out with a 65 watt red reptile heat light. 

Copyright belongs to Lara Inglis

These guys eat mostly insects so I give mine 7-8 gut loaded crickets 2-3 times a week. In the wild they also will eat some berries and other fruits.  So I will give mine a small mix of fresh cute up berries and fruits 1-2 times a week when I do not feed insects.  And like any reptile I always keep a bowl of fresh water in with mine. 

Over all they are a nice lizard to keep if you want something that you can handle.

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The model for all these cute pictures is Toni

Copyright belongs to Lara Inglis

This is my Schneider’s Skink, Toni (named after Tony Stewart who drives the #20 car in NASCAR…but “I” instead of “Y” b/c she is a girl). She was a rescue I just got a few days ago. Someone had dropped her off at the pet store I frequent and just didn’t want her anymore. So when I went in to get feeders for my other herps the other day the owner asked me if I wanted to take her. She is so sweet and friendly..how could I pass her up!? She is also very healthy so I don’t understand how anyone could just give up such a nice lizard like her. She actually likes to crawl into my hair and sleep underneath my pony tail. Someone really loved her for her to be comfortable doing that so who ever had her must have had other life reasons to have to give her up. Well she’s got a good permanent home now.

Taken from her introduction to Toni in her deviantart account.

It’s been fun introducing both Aunt Lara and the super cute Toni 🙂

See you again in the next edition of Herptile Spotlight.

PS. All the pictures are made  so small because I want you to click on the picture to see it bigger, it will take you to where the picture originally belong to.