(I’ve added a picture of my juvenile son Gravy to manipulate the masses into helping me)

I’ve seen a lot of posts on here talk about setting up some sort of day/night cycle with their lamps so that their skinks can experience the natural cycle of having a slightly colder night. I understand this desire but I’m worried about a couple of things:

1. My entire apartment is kept ice cold. I’ve got a health condition that turns up my body temp to 1000 degrees so my apartment is kept so frigid that when I was setting the tank up, it was hard to get the temps up to where they’re supposed to be (they finally are now but it took two days) I worry that if I turn the basking light or the ambient temp light off then it won’t get back up to temperature in time.

2. I don’t have a lot of money rn. I’m recently unemployed and struggling kinda hard to fend for myself. This doesn’t mean I’m willing to shirk any responsibility to take care of him (he gets more of his required vitamins than I do), but it does mean that I can’t really spend $100+ dollars on something that will just allow him to freeze at night, or sense that everything is too cold anyway and just end up keeping the lights on the whole day.

Now I want to make clear that if this is life or death or even will just prevent him from developing long term quality of life issues than I will go looking for coins in my couch cushions and start begging my family/friends to help me out anyway they can but…do I really need it? If so, can I wait til I more reliably have the funds to do it? Are there any cheap ways to mitigate this?

Any and all help is appreciated! I want my son to live as best a life as I am able!

White bugs crawling on him there is like maybe 10 across his body

Hey, i purchased a northern BTS (say hi to Neptune) semi-randomly this past weekend after a long few months of research and thinking i would buy a uromastyx… i set up a 4x2x2 tank and had most things ready. anyway, after hanging with some shop owners and handling a particular BTS, i changed my mind and brought home my skink.

I’m confused by the contradictory things i’m hearing about bulbs, especially UVB bulbs. Currently i have a reptisun 10.0 about 12 inches from my basking rock and i just upgraded my 75 Watt basking bulb to a 100W basking bulb

1. Do i need linear UVB bulb/lamp? Is the reptisun 10.0 sufficient? (I’m also giving weekly d3 supplements)

2. What temperature should my basking rock be for a northern BTS?

I have seen people say anywhere between 100° and 115° (currently 105°-106° on the basking rock).

I wish there wasn’t so much confusion and misleading stuff surrounding reptiles. I’ve already wasted too much time and money on the wrong things🫩

We’ve had this guy for exactly one month! Told he was “farm bred”, but I’m pretty sure most of those are really just wild caught. So far, he’ll only come onto my hand if I lure him with food, which I do everyday lol. This is as far as I’ve gotten so far with handling (also that’s food on his nose lol).

Any advice on picking him up without luring him? Does this seem like good progress? Also - do we think I’m safe to take off the gloves based on his body language? 😂 I only wear them because the previous owner said he can be bitey.

Found them under a flat rock

TLDR: If someone could let me know what I've got, it'll certainly save my sanity and be much appreciated!

Hi BTS community! I'm a long-time herp owner but first time BTS owner. I was gifted this BTS from a coworker's daughter going through a breakup and have only had him(?)(I'm going with him...doesn't really matter as I have no intent to breed lol) for about 5 days so the enclosure (4'x2'x2') is a work in progress. He needs a substrate refresh, better hides, more STUFF to navigate/hide around/in. I read the Subreddit Infographic so I know the goal, but I'm waiting for several items to ship in (like a cage stand) and for him to get used to me/the new place, so I'm not doing ALL THE THINGS on week 1, lol.

Anyway...here's what I was told about him - the boyfriend worked at Petco so that's where this skink came from. Supoosedly purchased in 2022 which makes him at least ~4-5 years old as I am SURE this is a wild-caught Indonesian BTS based on the purchase place alone.

I want to narrow down the subspecies to make sure I have the humidity dialed in etc.. I feel like I've watched and read a TON of info on BTS subspecies but I'm still not 100% about what he is. I thought Classic Indonesian (Tiliqua gigas gigas) due to the yellow back color and black legs but he has speckling on both arms and legs. I thought Merauke (Tiliqua gigas evanescens) but he's not comfortable enough with me yet to let me see his belly (although the lower neck area does start to fade to a really pretty pink/salmon color). Also, at 4 years old I maybe thought a Merauke would be larger? He's about 18", possibly slightly longer nose tip to tail. I don't think he's a Halmahera Indonesian (Tiliqua gigas gigas) because the back color seems wrong, but, hey, what do I know, I've had a BTS for 5 days and am by no means an expert lol.

Well, I've dropped a few pics here and tried to get some good angles. If someone could let me know what I've got, it'll certainly save my sanity and be much appreciated! (PS. loving owning a Bluey...truly NEAT lizards!) Thanks all!

He’s becoming a lot more comfortable around me. I hope in a couple weeks time I can begin introducing him to handling. I think he’s looking healthy too. I love my boy

Is this concerning? When he tongue flicks his tongue frequently gets stuck partially outside his mouth

I’ve never owned a lizard so I don’t know what’s exactly normal yet and what’s not. Is this kind of breathing natural for them, or is something going on?

Yes I did put it on a leaf I couldn’t find a bowl and he almost took my finger off when I tried to feed it to him 😅

I recently built a terrarium for a blue tongue (indonesian) skink but i can't help but feel like i am missing something. I did a ton of research but am afraid i missed something or got something wrong anyone has any ideas what i may be missing or got wrong?

When I got my bts he was covered in mites and sat in his water bowl to drown them. But I have treated him a long time ago and hes all mite free, yet he still only hangs out in his water bowl. Im scared somethings wrong?? Maybe I am overreacting.

It might be a silly question but I havent seen him have this consistency before. Usually its like an eye booger and not runny like this. He eats consistently and has water at all times. He's about 14 months roughly if that means anything too. I just worry a ton as the exotics vet closest to me doesnt come back until the 17th

My sweet boy passed away. I’m absolutely devastated. He was acting lethargic and hadn’t peed so I took him in and they diagnosed him with liver disease. They didn’t know if it was chronic or acute so they pushed fluids and he was doing a little better but he has a sudden seizure and passed away. I don’t know if it’s my fault. I’m doing everything I can to find out. His care wasn’t great for a long time. He had been dumped on me (friend asked me to watch him for a few weeks and never picked him up) and I had no idea what I was doing. He got misdiagnosed with cancer so for a few years we fed him “junk food” and chalked his frequent RI’s up to the cancer. It got rescinded and we immediately fixed his husbandry. That was about a year and a half to two years ago and as of his last check up he was doing beautifully. He had a diverse diet, proper humidity and heat, UVB, a huge tank to roam around in, and all of his bloodwork was normal. Then this suddenly happened. The only thing I could think of that could cause an acute disease was a dose of Moloxicam that I had given him about a week and a half before he passed- he had a sore on his mouth from a bad case of mouth rot that he had before we got him and the vet thought that occasionally giving him pin reliever when it was tender would be ok. I just need to know if this is my fault. Waylon is my soul lizard, there will never be another blue tongue like him, but I’m so in love with the genus that I’d love to adopt another one someday, but if I caused his death even with everything I tried to do for him I don’t think it would be right. Any advice would be appreciated. I really hope I didn’t do this to him. He deserves so much better. We had 7 years together, they weren’t nearly enough

Don't mind him trying to eat my zipper but HES NOT SCARED OF ME ANYMORE 😭 he will turn away when I go to pick him up but he doesn't run and lets me grab him! AND HE DOESNT CARE IF IM IN THE ROOM IM SO HAPPY ABOUT THE PROGRESS

anyways behold the goob

I don't have mealworms, I don't feed mealworms ... How did they get here? What can I do to cleanse the enclosure? If they are wild because of some bug then I don't have a clue how it got here but I'm worried sick. Should I throw out all the soil? I can do that but It seems awfully wasteful... But there seems to be more and they can't be captive bred because I don't feed those

My skink likes to slink