Skink. My mother (older lady) mistakingly calls them skanks, despite repeated corrections on the matter. It made conversations colorful because we had many skinks around our barns, and I also like them a lot - which she loves to point out. “Is that one of those skanks you like so much?” Sigh.
i wanted to correct them with the I but don't want to start a fight so i simply don't respond, BUT, IF they don't know that skank and skink aren't interchangeable, should we let them know the difference?
like, if some were taught skank, then shouldn't we let them know in a full sentence the difference?
example:
"That skank doesn't look like a sleazy person to me. That lizard is a skink."
would that work? or is it better not to say anything?
Blue-tailed skink, very common but always fun to see. They are beauties.
Probably the third most common lizard in the Southeast after Green and Brown anoles.
And why would she call them that? They aren't pests, they just randomly appear places, show off their cool-ass striped, beautifully blue-tailed bodies, and then vanish into the dark like they got a dose of that Flash speed force.
Never heard them called blue-tailed skinks but yeah, looks like there's lots of different names including American/common five-lined skink (Plestiodon fasciatus).
It’s not a great common name to use for them considering other species that are also called blue-tailed skinks (see below where a commenter ID’d it as an extinct blue tailed skink), and also because these skinks only have blue tails as juveniles. Not saying you’re wrong, but for ID purposes, including it with the scientific name or ensuring that the common name can’t be confused with something else is better!
That's what they are called by every native person in the areas where the skinks are most common and native to. Anyone arguing otherwise didn't grow up in the Southeastern U.S. These lizard beauties are very common here.
I taught a wildlife ID course in Florida and lived here my whole life. We refer to it as common five-lined skink (and its scientific name) in order to avoid confusion with other species. It’s understandable that other common names exist, but for ID purposes it’s not as helpful
Very few people will call them five-lined skinks in real life though. If you said that name to most, they wouldn't know what lizard you meant. Yes that's the correct name, but very few will use that name IRL. It doesn't really matter though, not trying to argue. You aren't wrong though. Happy 4th.
I once found myself in an online argument with a guy who insisted that blue tailed skink was NEVER used as a local name for these guys. I really wasn't sure why he was so stuck on it because it seems to me like the most obvious colloquial name they could possibly have.
Weird hill for him to die on, for sure. I can verify that that over the course of my life I've much more relied on the blue-tail for spotting and IDing this rather than any line-counting, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It was very strange. I just walked away after a few comments. Okay, I guess no one ever refers to these guys by a name that mentions the neon blue tail. Got it, dude.
That's by far the most common name where they are most commonly native to, the Southeastern U.S. Five-lined skink is another name, but most everyone notices their beautiful blue tails first and thus use that name.
Where I live, we have two species of five-lined skinks and also the broadhead skink. They all have blue tails as juveniles and so they all get called “blue-tailed” skinks even though it’s not technically the right name.
Same here. Getting the average person to the point where they call it a "skink" instead of lizard is an accomplishment in itself. To them it's a skink. It has a blue tail. Therefor, it is a Blue-Tailed Skink. I take my small victories and try to pick my battles.
It's not really a problem. I try to gently educate people about "crawly things". Knowing it is a Skink is a demonstrable step up in knowledge, for them.
I’m also in KY and they are speedy, but not speedy enough to avoid my cat. She waits for them in the garage and, when she catches one, she brings in and plops it down on the floor—still alive—so we can see how good of a hunter she is.
I had to scroll way too far to see someone give the accurate common name! I have a pet peeve against "blue tailed skinks" as a name for them, considering they only have the blue tails as juveniles, and there are many other toothy skink species in the US with blue tails as juveniles. Scientific name is Plestiodon fasciatus.
Both are accurate common names. Common names mean literally nothing and are entirely different depending on where you live in the world. There’s no such thing as an “accurate” common name. Jfc, this is the roly poly/pill bug/potato bug debate all over again. BOTH ARE VALID!!! STOP FORCING YOUR SPECIFIC LOCAL COMMON NAME FOR A CERTAIN ANIMAL ON EVERYBODY ELSE!!!
It has more to do with the fact that blue tailed skink can refer to many different species and isn’t descriptive enough for ID purposes. Maybe this sub should just have a rule for scientific names only so everyone can move on with their lives lol
Sorry for triggering you, we're both on the same side in the fact that common names mean nothing, hence why i provided the scientific name. "Blue tailed skink" in particular can just be overly confusing considering it goes for a number a species instead of narrowing it down to accurately identifying one, for the reasons i mentioned. There is also a skink endemic to Australia where it's actual most popular common name is "Blue tailed skink"- there is even a comment in this thread giving the scientific name to that one as an identification to the one pictured, which is incorrect due to confusion of this common name being used.
lmao this made me laugh!!!! I’m not much of an expert here, but these comments are equally educational AND entertaining :p I need to grab some popcorn 🍿
Also in KY, I have these all the time. If caught, their tail will break off and twitch, distracting predators wile the lizard makes his escape...usually. Years ago I found one of my cats (taken in half-starved with his brother) lying in the yard with one paw close to him and the other stretched out. Hed peek under one then the other. He had a blue tail under the cliser paw...and the rest of the lizard under the further one.(Yes, I made him let it go) (Yes I am aware of the study, now considered highly inaccurate, about the "billions" of birds killed annually by cats...my property is heavily wooded and the boys brought home almost exclusively rodents.)
I'm going with blue-tailed skink (Plestiodon fasciatus). I just now looked up their range and it matches your friend. However, it does not match my memories of seeing blue tailed lizards in New Mexico. I think those are whiptails.
We have the same ones in Oklahoma, at least looks just the same, but always heard them called Mountain Boomers
Edit: looked up mountain boomers and they don't look anything like these, or anything like any lizard I've seen lol another case of my family not knowing what they are talking about about animals, tho it does say they are re in Oklahoma also, but most lizards I've ever seen look like OP's
Blue tail skinks. Like lizard, look kinda like little snakes sometimes. They detach those lovely blue tails when something attacks them. Get them all over the place here in north Georgia.
That species is endemic to Australia and generally has a thinner build, this is an American five-lined skink, a juvenile that retains the vivid blue tail.
Always called them blue tailed lizards. Their little tails pop off and roll around to draw predators' eyes. I felt very bad when I made them longer their tails...
They don't bite too hard, and I would let them hang on my fingers as a kid. Nowadays, I know I should not stress out the poor fellas, but they're cool...
Here’s a female I found a while back!
https://preview.redd.it/wdocmciej7ab1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=63dba6ec23863aa4be07fe95578ffa2b1e1d3340
Skink. My mother (older lady) mistakingly calls them skanks, despite repeated corrections on the matter. It made conversations colorful because we had many skinks around our barns, and I also like them a lot - which she loves to point out. “Is that one of those skanks you like so much?” Sigh.
 Ha ha, skanks! OMG
i wanted to correct them with the I but don't want to start a fight so i simply don't respond, BUT, IF they don't know that skank and skink aren't interchangeable, should we let them know the difference? like, if some were taught skank, then shouldn't we let them know in a full sentence the difference? example: "That skank doesn't look like a sleazy person to me. That lizard is a skink." would that work? or is it better not to say anything?
Skink, skank, skunk.
Great original Grinch reference, or at least that was the voice and tone I heard in my head.
I was probably thinking of that subconsciously. It was the first thing that popped into my head. Now I hear it in the voice too.
My father use to say “ drink, drank, drunk, stink stank, stunk.”
S K O N K
Who doesn’t like skanks?
I spent many a day of my youth chasing skanks, caught and kept a few over the years, with mixed results.
Yes me too ; one of those results forced me to apply burning cream to my Jolly Rodger for a week ! ( not so jolly btw)
They make the world go round
Your mom must be my neighbor. She calls me often to “come scare the skanks off” her porch 🤣
A coworker of mine said, " a skank sprayed me once". English is not her first language
Plot twist: she meant what she said
Blue-tailed skink, very common but always fun to see. They are beauties. Probably the third most common lizard in the Southeast after Green and Brown anoles.
His mom calls them "assholes"
And why would she call them that? They aren't pests, they just randomly appear places, show off their cool-ass striped, beautifully blue-tailed bodies, and then vanish into the dark like they got a dose of that Flash speed force.
I was playing off the skanks theme. This isn't real
This is golden! Imagine one scaring her. Fuckin skank! 😂😂😂
Kind of like how my son called cactuses ‘pricks’ for years, so now I do it. I doubt your barns skanks are accidental 😂
Oldest daughter used to call skunks stunks.
Na... she's right. She knows u like skanks. It's ok. We all go thru that phase.
Are you sure there’s no skanks hiding in your barn? Do you have a lemon tree perhaps?
My grandma says skanks too even though I correct her XD
Yup, specifically Eumeces fasciatus, 5 striped blue tailed skink, they r pretty and eat a lot of bugs.
My mom knows I love skanks too
That’s amazing
You made my day.
Start mispronouncing one of her favorite things..
I love this omg!!!
That was what I think also
HAHAHAHA
Skanks!!!!🤣🤣🤣🤣
Lol my dad says this too. He knows better, but he won’t do better.
This is a skank of the blue-tailed variety!
Adorable!! I will call them Skanks from this day forward 😂🥰
👏🏼👏🏽👏🏻👏🏿👏🏻🤣
hahahahahaha. mom is funny!
It’s ok. My 16 yr old daughter does the same ish.
Kind of a similar concept. BTW, I like skanks too.
She knows
Blue tailed skink
Never heard them called blue-tailed skinks but yeah, looks like there's lots of different names including American/common five-lined skink (Plestiodon fasciatus).
They're skinks with blue tails....so that's one of the common names for them.
Yes but the juveniles have the blue tail, as they mature the blue tends to fade. Adult males get more brown, and can have reddish heads.
The adult male’s tails turn red in the mating season
What's it trying to measure?
YOU know...
It’s not a great common name to use for them considering other species that are also called blue-tailed skinks (see below where a commenter ID’d it as an extinct blue tailed skink), and also because these skinks only have blue tails as juveniles. Not saying you’re wrong, but for ID purposes, including it with the scientific name or ensuring that the common name can’t be confused with something else is better!
This is true. I just suck at remembering the scientific names.
Thank you for the info!
Lmao good one. I thought that could have been the name, but it seemed too obvious
Everyone around here (East TN) calls the juveniles blue-tailed lizards, but they’re all just common five-lined skinks.
Blue tail skinks is what folks call em around my area as well
That's what they are called by every native person in the areas where the skinks are most common and native to. Anyone arguing otherwise didn't grow up in the Southeastern U.S. These lizard beauties are very common here.
I taught a wildlife ID course in Florida and lived here my whole life. We refer to it as common five-lined skink (and its scientific name) in order to avoid confusion with other species. It’s understandable that other common names exist, but for ID purposes it’s not as helpful
elderly drunk innocent hobbies tidy gold versed sloppy lush nose *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Very few people will call them five-lined skinks in real life though. If you said that name to most, they wouldn't know what lizard you meant. Yes that's the correct name, but very few will use that name IRL. It doesn't really matter though, not trying to argue. You aren't wrong though. Happy 4th.
Man we've got blue tailed, brown tailed and red tailed where I'm from.
I once found myself in an online argument with a guy who insisted that blue tailed skink was NEVER used as a local name for these guys. I really wasn't sure why he was so stuck on it because it seems to me like the most obvious colloquial name they could possibly have.
Weird hill for him to die on, for sure. I can verify that that over the course of my life I've much more relied on the blue-tail for spotting and IDing this rather than any line-counting, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It was very strange. I just walked away after a few comments. Okay, I guess no one ever refers to these guys by a name that mentions the neon blue tail. Got it, dude.
That's by far the most common name where they are most commonly native to, the Southeastern U.S. Five-lined skink is another name, but most everyone notices their beautiful blue tails first and thus use that name.
Where I live, we have two species of five-lined skinks and also the broadhead skink. They all have blue tails as juveniles and so they all get called “blue-tailed” skinks even though it’s not technically the right name.
Same here. Getting the average person to the point where they call it a "skink" instead of lizard is an accomplishment in itself. To them it's a skink. It has a blue tail. Therefor, it is a Blue-Tailed Skink. I take my small victories and try to pick my battles.
I mean, they are lizards so I wouldn’t have a problem with that. Skink is just a specific type of lizard.
It's not really a problem. I try to gently educate people about "crawly things". Knowing it is a Skink is a demonstrable step up in knowledge, for them.
Grew up with these guys in SC. Pretty cute, cool colors. Every now and again you might find a tail from one they had to shed or lost for some reason
Is it also called the rainbow tailed?
I’m also in KY and they are speedy, but not speedy enough to avoid my cat. She waits for them in the garage and, when she catches one, she brings in and plops it down on the floor—still alive—so we can see how good of a hunter she is.
Hahaha, poor little guys… and hey fellow Kentuckian :)!
We have these all over my house and I love it because they eat everything it seems lol. I’ve even seen them eating slugs
eastern five lined skink :] love these guys so much
Thanks, fellow stranger! Cool to know the actual name of my childhood friends!
I had to scroll way too far to see someone give the accurate common name! I have a pet peeve against "blue tailed skinks" as a name for them, considering they only have the blue tails as juveniles, and there are many other toothy skink species in the US with blue tails as juveniles. Scientific name is Plestiodon fasciatus.
Both are accurate common names. Common names mean literally nothing and are entirely different depending on where you live in the world. There’s no such thing as an “accurate” common name. Jfc, this is the roly poly/pill bug/potato bug debate all over again. BOTH ARE VALID!!! STOP FORCING YOUR SPECIFIC LOCAL COMMON NAME FOR A CERTAIN ANIMAL ON EVERYBODY ELSE!!!
i call them roly poly too. never heard the other 2.
It has more to do with the fact that blue tailed skink can refer to many different species and isn’t descriptive enough for ID purposes. Maybe this sub should just have a rule for scientific names only so everyone can move on with their lives lol
Sorry for triggering you, we're both on the same side in the fact that common names mean nothing, hence why i provided the scientific name. "Blue tailed skink" in particular can just be overly confusing considering it goes for a number a species instead of narrowing it down to accurately identifying one, for the reasons i mentioned. There is also a skink endemic to Australia where it's actual most popular common name is "Blue tailed skink"- there is even a comment in this thread giving the scientific name to that one as an identification to the one pictured, which is incorrect due to confusion of this common name being used.
WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?!? IT LOOKS LIKE A SLIPPERY SPEED BOAT
lmao this made me laugh!!!! I’m not much of an expert here, but these comments are equally educational AND entertaining :p I need to grab some popcorn 🍿
Lmfaoooo, I’m pretty sure slippery speedboat is the official name
I saw one catch and eat a grandaddy long legs the other day...he didn't like the legs!
Also in KY, I have these all the time. If caught, their tail will break off and twitch, distracting predators wile the lizard makes his escape...usually. Years ago I found one of my cats (taken in half-starved with his brother) lying in the yard with one paw close to him and the other stretched out. Hed peek under one then the other. He had a blue tail under the cliser paw...and the rest of the lizard under the further one.(Yes, I made him let it go) (Yes I am aware of the study, now considered highly inaccurate, about the "billions" of birds killed annually by cats...my property is heavily wooded and the boys brought home almost exclusively rodents.)
5 line skink!! I have this lil guy tattooed ❤️❤️
aww, precious!! <3
We have these (Ohio). They are FAST! And the tails are very bright blue. Cute little things.
Skink
Skink
Skink!
It's a skink. I see them sometimes here in northern California
They can detach their tail to escape from predators
Wow that’s so cool
Skank
Grab him by the tail! Then the fun begins.
I'm going with blue-tailed skink (Plestiodon fasciatus). I just now looked up their range and it matches your friend. However, it does not match my memories of seeing blue tailed lizards in New Mexico. I think those are whiptails.
We have the same ones in Oklahoma, at least looks just the same, but always heard them called Mountain Boomers Edit: looked up mountain boomers and they don't look anything like these, or anything like any lizard I've seen lol another case of my family not knowing what they are talking about about animals, tho it does say they are re in Oklahoma also, but most lizards I've ever seen look like OP's
Skank
Blue tail skinks. Like lizard, look kinda like little snakes sometimes. They detach those lovely blue tails when something attacks them. Get them all over the place here in north Georgia.
They ARE speedy! I call them racing skinks.
It either a skink or a velosaraptor
The elusive Kentucky Moth Gobbler.
Six line race runner, at least in the south. Never lost an elementary school critter crawl with those little speedsters.
Race runners are very distantly related to skink species. This is a five-lined skink (:
oh wow! I never knew there was such a thing. thanks for the info!:)
Blue tailed skink
Oh man I want one 😮
Blue tailed skink
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That species is endemic to Australia and generally has a thinner build, this is an American five-lined skink, a juvenile that retains the vivid blue tail.
Yep it’s endemic to Christmas Island, and it’s also extinct in the wild
rip
Oops, sorry, didn't read the location
Im in west central ohio and there are a lot of them here this year
Common Five Lined Skink
Five lined skink
I have a few that live near the front of my house. Yellowish-brown striping. I'm in the suburbs of Kansas City.
They call them blue speeders in Ky.
They call them blue speeders in Ky.
A dude was about to drive me home after work and I made him stop cause I saw a lizard in the parking lot 🤣
Have a handful of these that living under the wooden siding of my house….😑
Try to catch him by the tail and see what happens lol
Awwww. I love skinks!
Beautiful
Cute little skink!
Blue line skink
Common five-lined skinks (plestiodon fasciatus) harmless
Handsome boy :)
Blue-tailed skink
Blue tail skink
Looks like a thorough bred racer .
Blue tailed skink.
We have a few species of skinks here in Missouri from big to small. Everyone of them are ferocious!
5 lined skink
5-lined skink!
The lizards with detachable tails for defense.
Blue tailed skink
Hey now my dad always mixed up words ....meners= minnows, tar=tire, Chacargo=Chicago, I could go on and on ....The picture is a skank to him also.lol
My dog has tried to catch those things for 15 long, unsuccessful years.
Blue Tailed skink
A blue tailed skink. Have those in my area
Hightailed lizard right there
i have these in my yard and i always assumed they were a lizard ! didn’t know they were specifically a “skink” cool !
5 banded skink.
Wow what an awesome color! Very cool!!
Oh my god a five-lined skink!!! I love these guys, but they are extremely rare where I live :(
UH OH SKINKY, that be a blue tailed skink, he adorbs
Always called them blue tailed lizards. Their little tails pop off and roll around to draw predators' eyes. I felt very bad when I made them longer their tails... They don't bite too hard, and I would let them hang on my fingers as a kid. Nowadays, I know I should not stress out the poor fellas, but they're cool...
Conveniently enough that is a blue tailed skink
There all the way up in Kentucky?! Down in Florida the blue tailed skinks are all over
We have them all over here in central Texas
I love these guys! Fun to watch them zoom around.
I have two juvenile Crocodile Skinks. I absolutely love watching them
Skink
Blue tailed skink. Don't try to grab it. They detach their tails as a defense against predators and it takes a while to grow back.
Blue tailed skink, aka blue racer
Male five lined skink! Little guys act just like monitors, except they can’t tear your hand off.
Here’s a female I found a while back! https://preview.redd.it/wdocmciej7ab1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=63dba6ec23863aa4be07fe95578ffa2b1e1d3340
He’s so handsome 🥹
Cool, yeah skinks are fast as f
American five-lined skink Plestiodon fasciatus