keeping garden skinks

[kwaka_80]

Im looking to keep some garden skins in my enclosure... would they be hard to keep, I have UV and Heat for them... i asume they eat little bugs and insects and could i add bigger lizzards in there with them say a netted or bearded dragons??

[Thor1]

which ones are you looking to keep?
those dark brown ones that get to around 15cm or more or
those yellowy ones with the racing stripes. damm they are quick!!!

[leptir]

I think they need to be on license in NSW

[jordo]

It would be illegal, and if you put large lizards with them they would be lunch.

[kwaka_80]

illegal... i have hundreds out in my garden i wouldnt class them as endagerd so i dont feel as bad taking them, i would just like them to "fill" my enclosure... i dont mind if they are food they can be thought of as feeder lizzards... why not i can get feeder fish

[leptir]

Whats the use of having "UV and Heat" for them if your just going to feed them off?
IMO if you want to fill you enclosure, do it the legal way by buying more lizards

[mrboajangles]

kwaka_80. wouldnt you be concerned about parasites etc?? and if your other lizards are eating other stuff (eg insects) already, why feed them other lizards?

[jordo]

illegal... i have hundreds out in my garden i wouldnt class them as endagerd so i dont feel as bad taking them, i would just like them to "fill" my enclosure... i dont mind if they are food they can be thought of as feeder lizzards... why not i can get feeder fish

Just because they are numerous, it doesn't make it legal to keep them :roll:
Why waste food, electricity and time for garden skinks when you have them in your garden anyway??

[kwaka_80]

yeah good point, i was mainly "wasting" the energy and food on the dragons and not particularly the skinks, but still avaliable for them

[jack]

I wish I had been forward thinking enough to catch a heap of small skinks prior to the NSW amnesty. A few hundred clean garden skinks bred for feeding elapids would have saved a whole lot of bother and allowed more keepers to keep some pretty snakes.

[MrBredli]

I wish I had been forward thinking enough to catch a heap of small skinks prior to the NSW amnesty.

I wish I had been forward thinking enough to catch a heap of Green Tree Pythons & Womas prior to the NSW amnesty.

[jack]

yeah, that too MrBredli!!!!

[Sdaji]

Netted and Bearded Dragons will certainly eat them and catching them is illegal, at least in most states. I dare say that using them as feed lizards for dragons is not ethical when they'll happily eat woodies or vegetables.

I've bred a few happy and healthy generations of two species of garden skinks without UV and I bought mine from someone who had been keeping them for a long time without UV. I'm thoroughly convinced that they don't require it.

Jack: breeding skinks is a lot more time consuming than force feeding pinkies, a heck of a lot more expensive and arguably worse for the snake (unless it was a small elapid which was going to be on a skink diet for its whole life). Which pretty snakes would you like to keep which need skinks? The only ones which need them are some of the small elapids.

[scam7278]

why would any reptile keeper/breeder want to catch a lizard just to feed another bigger lizard ? i have beardies and i wouldnt even dream of doing that to a cute little skink. they may be common but they are still lizards

[pike1]

[/quote]
Why waste food, electricity and time for garden skinks when you have them in your garden anyway??[/quote]
Maybe because they are interesting in their own right.I use to keep them when i was a kid, had about 10 in a 3ft fish tank, they had their own holes they use to peep their heads out, waiting for a bug.Use to watch them for hours, beat watching tv,i would keep them again in a second.