Rescued Lampropholis delicata ( Delicate Grass Skink ).

[kingofnobbys]

The story so far :
12 July (middle of winter) my handyman brought a little skink to me that he disturbed when he was digging to set the steel posts for my under boundary fence timber sleeper retaining wall ( needed after a lot earth was removed to extend my double garage with a carport and a 3m x 9m front work slab) .
It came inside cupped in his hands very scared, very cold , and thankfully not injured , so I've opted to give it a home until the work in my backyard is all done and it's "safe" for it live outside and fend for itself again ( Yeh I know, I'll get attached and wont want to release it , and it'll become ubertame and friendly and super pampered like all my pet lizards and rescues do).

This little skink is a about the same size as Godzilla and is a delicate garden skink : Lampropholis delicata
https://bie.ala.org.au/species/urn:lsid:biodiversity.org.au:afd.taxon:58f6d1ae-e9c4-42cb-b321-d506e83abb7e

22july

Itchy the juveniles standing up (on the hunt and exploring).

Scratchy eating cricket under hide.

Looky …. a little blue tongue licking lips.

Itchy in petry dish water pond for a drink

And a bath

I've always liked this species of skink, grew up catching them in my family home's front and back yards at Mayfield NSW, and my granddad's yard ( Waratah) and around the school as a kiddie , and in the local "bush" and on Ash Island . And I've always had a healthy colony of them on my property here.
One of the most common skinks around here - they are literally in every yard if there is no cat in residence.


and has settled in very nicely in Godzilla's little tub, and has proven a great insect hunter, making very quick work of weenie woodies and weenie crickets I've given it each day (about 6 per day).

I have at least three colonies of these little skinks living on my property , one group lives in my shed, one group lives in the little shrub garden next to my greenstrip, and the bigger group lives under my house.

a 2" plastic petri dish is a great bath and soaking pool for Little T ( subsequently named Itchy)

Itchy is a great eater. !!!

 

[kingofnobbys]

9 September - Itchy lays a clutch of eggs and is very excited (trying to get my attention when after her first egg is laid).

Itchy has been very active today , trying to get my attention, just checked and discovered a pill sized white egg has been laid . There I was thinking that she was just overfed and getting chubby.

and egg #2 laid a few minutes ago

Here's mum :

Not so keen to go back into the tub, but she sure seems to like the warmth of my hand and arm.
I think there are still some eggs inside her judging from her lumps and bumps.

Such a big egg from such a small skink …. will be interesting to see if she lays any more eggs and if they are fertile.
Fortunately I'm in their natural range as a species , and I should be able to get away with just ambient room temperatures ( 24 degC to 26 degC ) to incubate the egg(s).


Since she's using calcium to make eggs, I've added a drop of CalciVet to the water dish to help her replentish her calcium levels.

10pm she's settled down now , laid 3 eggs , think she has some more developing inside her as I can see some lumps and they are slowly moving down towards her never regions.
3 eggs now.

I've not got any perlite on hand so I've a tiny piece of absorbant paper towel dampened and simply placed the eggs on this and folded over so the eggs remain "damp"

A Guide to Australian Skinks in Captivity (D.Brown) suggests the species Lampropholis delicata typically form communal nests between stacked bricks or pavers or in the holes in bricks or concrete blocks and 1 to 8 eggs each and sometimes the nest will have up to 160 eggs from several breeding females all incubating in the cavity. (Seems not really necessary to bury their eggs, acid test it seems will be if the eggs swell over then next two weeks.)
The temperatures in my house will be fine.
(p 325 - 329).

I've not got any pearlite on hand so I've a tiny piece of absorbant paper towel dampened and simply placed the eggs on this and folded over so the eggs remain "damp"
The moist paper towel will have to suffice for now as I'm not set up to incubate reptile eggs.
Once she stops laying, I'll likely move the eggs to a spare silkworm egg hatching tub and wait to see if any hatchlings emerge in 33 to 42 days.

11 September
I've set up a incubator of sorts for the 3 L.Delicata skink eggs, essentially, it's soaked sheet of scot-towel in a round ( ex- BSFL tub ) with a small plastic lid on top, the eggs are on a damp piece of scot-towel which is folder over them. The lid snaps on , and is ventilated.
I've ordered in a small packet of perlite but probably wont need them unless Cleo becomes gravid.

I have this incubator tub on the floor of Fluffy's tub ( stays about 26 degC overnight, and about 28-30 degC during the day), Fluffy's ( my pet Eastern Water Skink's) cool zone.
Fluffy was very curious about the tub , she investigates everything that's new right away. She's adopted the lid as a new basking spot.

Itchy has been looking for her eggs since I removed them from her and Scratchy's shared tub , but there isn't space in there.
The slightly sweetened water ( 2 or 3 drops from an eyedropper of CalciVet in the water ) is a hit with Itchy and Scratchy, they seem to have a sweet tooth , the solution is quiet sweet tasting and I've never had a problem getting rescued lizards to take it orally.

 

[kingofnobbys]

Make that 4 eggs.
Itchy was quite active once the egg had moved near her bottom yesterday and overnight - labor pains - trying to lay it (?).

Laid It sometime between 11am and 2pm today , she's much more settled now..

 

[MrSpectrum]

Fascinating thread! Have to confess my brain froze for a moment on...

This little skink is a about the same size as Godzilla and is a delicate garden skink : Lampropholis delicata

... until I realized "Godzilla" must be the name of one of your other charges. :lol:
(We'd recently watched a couple of Godzilla movies, and... y'know... :laughing6: )

This reminds me of the green anoles--Anolis carolinensis--I kept as a kid (and later as an adult), and the Western fence lizard--Sceloporus occidentalis--I recently posted about [ Invalid URL Removed / p= t=250975 f=33 ].

Here's hoping the eggs hatch!

 

[kingofnobbys]

Fascinating thread! Have to confess my brain froze for a moment on...

This little skink is a about the same size as Godzilla and is a delicate garden skink : Lampropholis delicata

... until I realized "Godzilla" must be the name of one of your other charges. :lol:
(We'd recently watched a couple of Godzilla movies, and... y'know... :laughing6: )

This reminds me of the green anoles--Anolis carolinensis--I kept as a kid (and later as an adult), and the Western fence lizard--Sceloporus occidentalis--I recently posted about [ Invalid URL Removed / p= t=250975 f=33 ].

Here's hoping the eggs hatch!

Rite of passage for kids in the 60s , catching lizards, frogs , collecting tadpoles , catching yabbies to keep as pets .

Itchy is so comfortable and secure now that she often just crashes on the top of her shared lid (hide) and spends a lot of time there studying me and the other bigger lizards ( BTs , water skink and bearded dragons ). No longer darts away to hide when my wife or I walk past the tub her and Scratchy are living in , she actually pops her head out to see what's going on .

Scratchy is more shy , but even he's coming around , when I replace the water (daily) he often comes out and crawls my hand if I give the chance , a gentle tap on his nose generally is all that's needed to tell him "no".

They both like watching movies on the laptop who's screen is only 12" away from their tub.

 

[MrSpectrum]

Rite of passage for kids in the 60s , catching lizards, frogs , collecting tadpoles , catching yabbies to keep as pets .

Ah, you know the '60s!
Ya got me on yabbies--had to look it up. They're usually either crayfish or crawdads around here. :wink:
Spotted salamanders, various turtles... yeah, I guess the usual. :lol:

Could be you've convinced them you're not going to EAT them. The anoles exhibited similar behavior (except right after the dog almost ate one... I caught it by the base of the tail and pulled it out as it was going down her throat and on the way down. Whew!)
I don't think I'll ever forget the look I got from both of them (not to mention DW, who was freaking out about then). :roll:

 

[kingofnobbys]

Rite of passage for kids in the 60s , catching lizards, frogs , collecting tadpoles , catching yabbies to keep as pets .

Ah, you know the '60s!
Ya got me on yabbies--had to look it up. They're usually either crayfish or crawdads around here. :wink:
Spotted salamanders, various turtles... yeah, I guess the usual. :lol:

Could be you've convinced them you're not going to EAT them.

Yep a child of the 1960s , and was fortunate enough to live in the outskirts of suburbia with easy access to some remnant bush ( about 1 square mile between home and the school that I walked past and often through everyday and was great habitat for wild critters ). Spent a LOT of time there.
Back then kids had lots of freedom and only had to be home by dark or by diner time ( which ever came first ) .

 

[MrSpectrum]

Half a world apart, and kids are kids.
I was the same--2 blocks from a midsize city zoo, located in a beautiful natural park along a river gorge--woods, ponds, meadows... That was my stompin' grounds--until hormones kicked in. :lol:

Now I live on ~10 acres, most of it wooded, wetlands, and meadow. Unfortunately, unlike the park, I haven't seen any reptile life (aside from garter snakes, toads, tree frogs, and an occasional errant turtle) in 30 years. OTOH, mammalian wildlife is abundant here.

 

[kingofnobbys]

Scratchy , the smaller of the two has decided he thinks I'm OK too , he's now started voluntarily crawling onto my hand and seems to really like my thumb a handy perch .
Even let my 8 yr old grandson pet him when he was on my hand this evening, never even flinched.

I can't see my releasing these two , just too darned cute and becoming too friendly.

 

[kingofnobbys]

Two more eggs laid overnight.

The bigger older female Itchy passed away sometime today, discovered her dead ( I guess the effort of laying so many big eggs was too much for her , she seemed to be struggling to lay the last two eggs yesterday ).

It's a shame , she was a sweet natured girl.

 

[CooperDragon]

That's sad to hear =(. I wonder if her eggs will be viable.

 

[kingofnobbys]

Just checked , 3 of the eggs are starting "swell" like a balloon (the 1st 3 she laid ?) , so I think at least the ones that are swelling are viable .

 

[kingofnobbys]

6 of the eggs now swelling like a balloon.

 

[CooperDragon]

That's encouraging news! Please keep us posted =)

 

[kingofnobbys]

Wife and handyman report they've seen stacks of delicate skinks , water skinks and even a bluetongue in my yard near my shed and my feral pots and under the house ,and when out to shop.

Think Scratchy has sensed spring has finally arrived, he's been hyperactive and everytime I take the lid off or even crack it open to give him some bugs he's been wanting out and I nearly lost him a few times when he had a bee in his bonnet and wanted to go exploring, he's well fed and just completed another shed , so I've decided it'll be better for him to release him before he disappears under the furnature.

My garden beds are all built and ready for the fill to go in and to be topped up with premium garden soil .
My 6m x 1.2m privacy screen was finished today ( after much a-do - Bunnings delivered 2.4m x 0.9m and 1.8m x 0.9m premium t/pine diagonal lattice panels - despite my being very clear I required 2.4m x 1.2m and 1.8m x 1.2m panels and THEY CHARGED FOR the 1.2m wide panels !! …. had to go back and was a drama since they've been in storage for nearly 2 months , so 1/2 a day wasted that I've had to pay wages for !!) , Handyman took them to Glendale Bunnings who refused to exchange / refund , told him to take back to Belmont Bunnings (roll-eyes). I was playing phone hocky from 8am til 11am .
Finally finished it …. looks very good , and handyman says it's solid and very strong ( zero give in it ).

Onto repairing (some rotted timber and hardieflex cladding) on my old garage tomorrow (Monday , most of one of day of work , then tidy up ready to get the mini-digger / loader machine in to move fill into the bed when it's dry enough ( in maybe 3 weeks )).

My wild lizards will be safe now. So now's a good time to release him if I'm ever going to before I become too attached to him.

Still have the eggs …. wont be long now before they start hatching if they are viable.