the shingleBACK. By Jimmy and Alex
| The Shingleback is a large lizard with four short stumpy legs. It has
a tail that looks like a platypus tail. Shingleback lizards are very fat and sleepy. They are related to the skink family.
The Shingle Back can be orange to greenie blue. The males follow the females for
a number of weeks in Spring and have one to four babies in Summer or
early Autumn. They stay with the same partner for years. The Shingleback lives
in the dry parts of
Southern Australia. In captivity the longest living Shingleback has
lived for 15 years. Scientists think the Shingleback can live up to
fifty years. The Shingleback is almost identical to the Blue Tongue
lizard though the
Shingleback has very sharp scales and a blunt tail.
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The Shingleback has a varied diet of snails, insects and sometimes spiders. The Shingleback can grow up to 34 centimetres long. The Shingleback has a purple tongue to make it look fierce. They are gentle to humans and make good pets. The Shingleback can expand its lungs up to about 5 centimetres long. The end of a Shingleback's toe is called a phalanx. The Shingle back's skull is called an orbit around the eye ball. The skeleton of the Shingleback is very complicated, it has over 200 bones. If you rub its scales the wrong way they can go horizontal and it hurts the lizard. Shinglebacks love basking on hot rocks because they are cold blooded. |
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Fact File Full name: Trachydosauras
rougosus |
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