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Other common names for P. fasciatus include blue-tailed skink (for juveniles) and red-headed skink (for adults). It is technically appropriate to call it the American five-lined skink to distinguish it from the African skink Trachylepis quinquetaeniata (otherwise known as five-lined mabuya) or the eastern red-headed skink to distinguish it from its western relative Plestiodon skiltonianus ...
A male broad-headed skink, illustration from Holbrook's North American Herpetology, 1842. The broad-headed skink gets its name from the wide jaws, giving the head a triangular appearance. Adult males are brown or olive brown in color and have bright orange heads during the mating season in spring.
The conspicuous coloring of species of Plestiodon is a survival trait: it attracts a predator's attention to the tail of the animal, which will break off when grabbed. A skink thus often manages to escape and hide under some rock, log, or fallen leaves while the predator still contemplates the wildly thrashing severed tail.
It is a four-lined skink whose light stripes extend onto the tail. The broad dark lateral stripe is 4–4.5 scales wide and there are no light lines on top of the head. The dorsolateral light stripe is on the edges of the 3rd and 4th scale rows, counting from midline of back. One postmental scale is present.
Plestiodon egregius, mole skink; Plestiodon elegans, elegant skink, five-striped blue-tailed skink (juvenile), or Shanghai skink (East Asia) Plestiodon fasciatus, common five-lined skink; Plestiodon gilberti, Gilbert's skink (North America) Plestiodon inexpectatus, southeastern five-lined skink; Plestiodon kishinouyei, Kishinoue's giant skink
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Young western skinks have a bright blue tail with color that fades with age. Skinks can perform autotomy; if seized by a predator its tail is deliberately cast and wriggles violently attracting attention while the lizard may escape. [10] The tail will grow back with time but is often darker in color and misshapen.
Blue-tailed skink may refer to: Cryptoblepharus egeriae, a lizard native to Australia's Christmas Island; Plestiodon elegans, the five-striped blue-tailed skink, a lizard found in East-Asia; Plestiodon fasciatus, the five-lined skink of North America; Trachylepis margaritifera, the rainbow mabuya of Africa