Cape York paradise at Portland Roads
We often have interesting guests at Portland Roads. I was just talking to some Lizard people and told them about this little fellow. So just found out that this is a Major Skink. He was in our kitchen and ran under the bench, behind some boxes. This photo was in July 2011, but I also saw one the other day (December 2011). I surprised him throwing a bucket of water on the garden.
Watching vigorous sexual intercourse whilst having a shit in the morning should have been disturbing, but strangely enough it wasn’t. I was observing 2 copulating carlia longipes (skinks) – it was fascinating.
Carlia Longipes outside the toilet
The male started chasing the female, and when he caught her by the tail he looked as thoug
h he was he was going to eat her up tail first. He seemed to swallow about 5-6mm of tail then suddenly jumped and caught her just in front of her rear left leg. He held her firmly in his jaw for a while.
She kept trying to get away, until he flipped her over and got sort of sideways over her. They would be quite still for a few moments the he would spasm (I presume ejaculating), then it would start over again.
Finally she twisted around and bit him on the side (seemingly in a very gentle manner) – he let go or she escaped I’m not sure which.
She scuttled away but he swaggered around for a while with his genitals up in the air off the ground and his tail held strongly up in the air behind him. Although he was swaggering it looked very much as though his genitals were extremely tender if not painful.
All of this lasted for at least 5 – 10 minutes I would say.