What Do Blue Tailed Skinks Eat – 15 Examples Of Food
what do blue-tailed skinks eat? Locusts, crickets, spiders, roaches, snails, slugs, and earthworms are among the foods eaten by blue-tailed skinks in general.
Skinks with blue tails, on the other hand, will consume almost any bug. They’ve even been known to consume plants. There are a couple of alternatives that are both safer and healthier than the rest:
- Crickets
- Silkworms
- Larvae of flying insects
- Waxworms
- Mealworms
What Do Blue Tailed Skinks Eat
A lizard with a brilliant blue tail is difficult to overlook. The blue-tailed skink, sometimes known as the western skink, is a bright, tiny reptile (Plestiodon skiltonianus). Skinks with blue tails are diurnal, meaning they are active during the day and sleep at night.
In the spring and summer, you’ll most often see them lazing in the sun in the morning and late afternoon.
After emerging from a period of winter stasis, blue-tailed skinks normally mate in the spring and lay their eggs under loose soil in June or July, when temperatures are optimal. They achieve sexual maturity around the age of three and can live for up to ten years.
While the bright blue tail is typically used to identify this species, it is also possible to see this species without the bright blue tail.
Blue-tailed skinks’ colour fades with age, similar to how humans’ hair colour fades with age. You may have spotted a blue-tailed skink without even realizing it! Even if the lizard doesn’t have a blue tail, there are still a few ways to recognize it.
Related Guide: Do Skinks Make Noise? With 3 Examples
For example, they always have a dark brown or black band that runs from the side of their head to their hind legs. They are normally between 100 and 210 mm (4.25 to 8.25 inches) long, including their tail, so they are large enough to detect while hiking.
Autotomy is a skill that blue-tailed skinks share with many other lizards. When they are trapped by a predator, they can lose their tails, which can cause the predator to get distracted long enough for the skink to escape.
Their tails regrow, but they are usually darker and malformed. Blue-tailed skinks aren’t fussy when it comes to becoming predators. Crickets, beetles, flies, grasshoppers, spiders, and even earthworms can be found in their diet.
Blue-tailed skinks can be found from south-central British Columbia to southern Baja California and east to Montana in the Western United States. Keep an eye out for a small lizard with a blue caboose if you’re out for a walk in any of these locations.
What Do Blue Tailed Skinks Eat
Blue-tailed skinks are large lizards that like to eat a wide variety of foods. What should you feed your gorgeous lizard if you have one at home, and how does it compare to what they consume in the wild?
Furthermore, why feed a captive Blue Tailed Skink anything other than what a wild Blue Tailed Skink eats? Here, we break down everything you need to know about the diets of these lizards.
In the environment, these little creatures are predominantly insectivores, but they’re also a bit of an opportunist. We’ve highlighted five potential food sources they’re likely to encounter and consume in the wild.
Insects
Insects make up almost entirely of a wild Blue Tailed Skink’s diet. They don’t discriminate between insects either, eating ants, flies, grasshoppers, crickets, and whatever else they can find. They also do well with mealworms and other small insects that cannot flee as quickly as adults.
Lizards
If a wild blue-tailed skink encounters a smaller lizard, it’s likely that it will try to devour it.
However, this is one meal that a wild Blue Tailed Skink would never consume and should never be fed to your pet Skink.
The blue-tailed skink normally wins the combat, but they are frequently injured in the process, which can kill them over time.
It’s no surprise that a wild Blue Tailed Skink prefers to eat smaller foods such as insects and arachnids.
Arachnids
Did you realize that spiders aren’t actually insects? Although they are technically arachnids, the Blue Tailed Skink doesn’t appear to mind when they eat them.
Rodents
While it’s rare to see a Blue Tailed Skink consume a little rodent in the wild, this is primarily due to the fact that they don’t come across them very often.
Although they avoid mating sites because there are too many rodents there, a Blue-Tailed Skink can take a mouse down one-on-one in the wild.
Fruits and vegetables
While insects are preferred by wild Blue-tailed Skinks, they can also flourish on a plant-based diet. So, if they aren’t collecting enough insects in the wild and a variety of fruits and vegetables are available, they will surely eat them.
How often do you feed blue-tailed skink?
Crickets, mealworms, and waxworms with live guts. Add calcium to your food on a daily basis and a mineral supplement once or twice a week. Males and females should be kept apart. 15+ years, up to 18 inches long.
As Pets, What Do Blue-tailed Skinks Eat?
In captivity, a Blue Tailed Skink’s food is a little different. Because they don’t get as much action as other pets, you’ll have to be more careful about what you feed them.
In this article, we’ve selected 11 things that you should include in your skink’s diet.
Fruits and vegetables
Adults, unlike natural Blue Tailed Skinks, should be fed up to 70% fruit and vegetables. Captive Blue-tailed Skinks do not get as much exercise as wild ones and receive constant feedings, making them more prone to obesity.
To keep your adult Blue-tailed Skink happy and healthy, feed them kale, collard greens, red-tipped apple slices, figs, berries, and the occasional apple slice. If you have a baby or adolescent Blue Tailed Skink, feed them a protein-rich diet consisting mostly of insects until they reach adulthood.
Silkworms
Silkworms are easy to find and consume for your Blue Tailed Skink, and they’re high in protein, which helps your skinks to grow. Feed your Blue Tailed Skink a meal consisting of roughly 70% small insects, the majority of which should be silkworms, while it is an adolescent.
Crickets
Crickets, whether frozen or thawed, are a great option for your Blue Tailed Skink, but make sure they’re big enough before you feed them one. Adult Blue-tailed Skinks are more than capable of catching a cricket, but adolescents and newborns aren’t quite ready.
Worms
It makes no difference what kind of worm you feed your Blue-tailed Skink; they’ll happily eat it. To keep your skinks as happy as possible, introduce diversity by adding different kinds of worms. Just make sure you don’t overfeed your skink by giving them too many big worms.
Centipedes
The centipede is another little bug that both baby and adult Blue-tailed Skinks enjoy. These insects come in a variety of sizes, but at mealtime, your skink will break them down into bite-sized pieces. But, once again, don’t overdo it.
Grasshoppers
Your blue-tailed skink will eat a frozen or thawed grasshopper just like a cricket. Grasshoppers should only be fed to an adult Blue-tailed Skink. Otherwise, it’s simply too much food for a newborn or adolescent to consume all at once, and breaking it down into smaller bits is more difficult for them.
Spiders
There’s no reason why you can’t offer a smaller spider to your Blue Tailed Skink to eat. Make sure they’re not venomous and won’t harm your Blue-tailed Skink before using them. Also, make sure they’re not too big, especially if your skink is still a newborn or adolescent.
Beetles
There are over 350,000 species of beetles, and your blue-tailed skink will happily eat any of them. Simply make sure the beetle you’re feeding your skink isn’t too big and can’t defend itself.
Ants
A baby blue-tailed skink’s favourite food is ants. They are very small, making them simple to ingest and digest. Just make sure you don’t swarm the enclosure with ants all at once. If you do, the ants may flee, and you will most likely have ants all over your house.
Mealworms
Mealworms are excellent little invertebrates for both adult and juvenile Blue-tailed Skinks. These are high in protein, which is necessary for the growth and development of your skink. Not only that, but blue-tailed skinks eat these small worms as well!
Supplemental Minerals
A blue-tailed skink may eat a broad variety of items in the wild to meet its nutritional requirements. In captivity, this is far more difficult to achieve. As a result, we recommend that they take a mineral supplement with their meal to ensure that they get everything they need to stay happy and healthy.
To Sum UP
The blue-tailed skink is a bright, tiny reptile (Plestiodon skiltonianus). Skinks with blue tails are diurnal, meaning they are active during the day and sleep at night.
They are normally between 100 and 210 mm (4.25 to 8.25 inches) long. Blue-tailed skinks are large lizards that like to eat a wide variety of foods. What should you feed your lizard if you have one at home?
Here, we break down everything you need to know about the diets of these lizards. We’ve highlighted five potential food sources they’re likely to encounter and consume in the wild.
Captive Blue-tailed Skinks do not get as much exercise as wild ones and receive constant feedings, making them more prone to obesity.
In captivity, you’ll have to be more careful about what you feed them. Here are 11 things that you should include in your skink’s diet.
A baby Blue-tailed skink’s favourite food is ants. Adults prefer mealworms, which are high in protein and easy to digest. Skinks often take a mineral supplement to ensure they get all the nutrients they need for growth and development.
