American Five-Lined Skink

Welcome to this week’s Wildlife of the Week!

Our species this week is the American five-lined skink

Plestiodon fasciatus

Our Wildlife of the Week is the sleek American five-lined skink, also commonly called the blue-tailed skink because young skinks have a blue tail which disappears as they age. Young American five-lined skinks are dark brown to black with five distinctive white to yellowish stripes running along the body and a bright blue tail. The blue color fades to light blue with age, and the stripes also may slowly disappear. Females however, are more likely to retain the blue tail color as they age. The dark brown color fades, too, and older individuals are often uniformly brownish. They are five to nine inches long.

Five-lined skinks are one of the most common lizards in the eastern United States. They prefer moist woodland habitats and can be found under leaf litter and around rotting wood on the ground. They become dormant in the winter and emerge in the spring to mate. Mating season begins in May and the females lay eggs between the middle of May and July, at least one month after mating. Males will mate with multiple females. Females lay fifteen to eighteen eggs in a small cavity cleared beneath a rotting log, stump, board or loose bark and after four to six weeks the eggs hatch.

Their diet consists primarily of a variety of arthropods, particularly spiders, crickets, beetles and other insects. However, they have been reported to also eat newborn mice, frogs, and other lizards.

They will be active on the refuge for a few more weeks until early frosts. (Photo by Tom Ress)