The Eastern Blue-tongue Skink (Tiliqua scincoides), that lives under the house decided the cat bowls made for a quick and convenient lunch. I wonder if these are the first ever photos of a Blue-tongue with a milk moustache?
The Blue-tongue is the largest of the Skink family, and can grow to 600mm in length (including the tail). It is a very common lizard in the whole of Eastern and Northern Australia, with isolated populations in the centre.
Our tenant emerged from his wood-pile and took a turn around the lawn:
While he was on the lawn, it started to rain lightly, leaving some cute splashes on his back:
Two cats have adopted us this year, and as one is quite timid, we used to leave food out on the back deck for her – she was too shy to eat indoors. Unfortunately, too much local wildlife took to using the cat food as an easy meal, so we have now got tough with Missy, and she eats inside these days.
I’d like to be clear that we do not condone or advise allowing wildlife to eat processed foods, or to drink pet milk. This Blue-tongue surprised me when he happened upon the cat bowls, but the resultant photos are interesting.
Blue-tongues are relatively slow and not very agile. They usually go for slow moving prey – garden snails in particular. The stationary cat food was slow enough for this guy! He first decided the pet milk was something he would like. Strange to see a reptile doing something so mammalian as drinking milk:
And here he is with a heart-breakingly cute milk moustache:
The reason they are called Blue-tongues is that – well – they have blue tongues:
After his milk, he wanted cookies! I was more concerned with him eating these, than him drinking the milk. They are rather dry but swell when they are wet. Thankfully he did not eat too many of them.
Having had all he could eat, our tenant moved off. And we resolved that the cat bowls should always be inside from now on.
Bramandagram 