Who doesn't love blue tongue skinks? In this episode we discuss their ability to learn complex tasks, and finally discover why that tongue is so blue. Our Species of the Bi-Week is beautiful in more ways than one.

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Main Paper References:

Badiane, A., Carazo, P., Price-Rees, S. J., Ferrando-Bernal, M., & Whiting, M. J. (2018). Why blue tongue? A potential UV-based deimatic display in a lizard. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 72(7). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-018-2512-8

Szabo, B., Noble, D. W. A., Byrne, R. W., Tait, D. S., & Whiting, M. J. (2019). Precocial juvenile lizards show adult level learning and behavioural flexibility. Animal Behaviour, 154, 75–84. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anbehav.2019.06.003

Species of the Bi-Week:

Vanderduys, E., Hoskin, C. J., Kutt, A. S., Wright, J. M., & Zozaya, S. M. (2020). Beauty in the eye of the beholder: A new species of gecko (Diplodactylidae: Lucasium) from inland north Queensland, Australia. Zootaxa, 4877(2), 291–310. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4877.2.4

Music:

Intro/outro – Treehouse by Ed Nelson

Species Bi-week theme – Mike Mooney

Other Music – The Passion HiFi, www.thepassionhifi.com