Care Guide - mERAUKE Blue tongue skink

Can they be Cohabilitated?

What size do they get? -

When will i see them?

Costs to keep

How much will it roughly cost you to keep an individual Merauke BTS well including the setup and ongoing costs, this does not include unexpected vet bills or the rising cost of products over time.

Used for energy calculation : https://www.sust-it.net/energy-calculator.php

Distribution -

As you can see below there distribution is quite limited and even the times they have been spotted on iNaturalist in the wild they a very illusive. They are called the Merauke Blue tounge because most of there range is around the town called Merauke. This is a tropical savannah climate with hot tempratures all year round usually between 25c-35c and a rainy season 6 months of the year.

Image captured from iNaturalist

Below is as close as i could get to finding a habitat that was close to some of the places that they had been spotted, its very hard to find anything around this region of the world as ther is no street view in 2024 just user submitted images so to make do ive got as close as i can to an untouched area of land, as you can see there is muddy areas of land which suggest that either there was rain recently or nautrally the ground water is high, the lush open lands and trees in the distance are the kind of place that merauke Blue tonges would inhabit.

Merauke regency - Wariek

Rating - (Ease of care) - Beginner - ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆

Setup Requirements

You will need a large vivarium at a minimum of 5x2x2ft but it is my recommendation to always get as big as you can. When putting the vivarium together it is really important to silicone the edges toghether as this is a humid loving animal and the wood will perish within a year if you dont which is costly for such a big enclosure. Be careful when doing this aswell keep your area well ventilated better yet do it on a sunny day outside and let sit for the day to set, This silicone stinks like vinigar and is potent if you get a wiff of it, your eyes will water and you might have a coughing fit, dont risk it just keep safe.

Substrate options and decor

There a quite a few substrates you can use for your BTS, what i personally se right now is just Coco Fibre , i find that it is easy to keep moist and keeps the enclosure humid, its also very easy to sculpt around decor and tubes , you can use real and fake plants, i have personally used both just remeber that they will bulldose them down whenever they feel like it so dont expect them to last long unless you screw them down with pots.

Hides are essential and getting platic tubes like below can really bring extra enrichemnt for them. they love to dig an explore so make sure you have atleast depth and a half of the BST abdomen usually between 4-8 inches. You can add extra decor in as you wish but i would sugget more foliage than anything they dont climb well but do like shallow hills to dig and explore in.

It is esential to get a big basking rock directly under there basking spot, they will habitually use it to get themselves up to the tepratures they require for there basic metabolism needs.

Other substrates you can use include reptibark and other forst based substrates like coco husk, i will be using this for the next substrate change to give a more naturalised look to my enclosure.

Heating and lighting

Heating these incredible skinks is easy if you keep your room in the low to mid 20's at night you do not need to provide any additianal heating, all that is really required is a basking lamp between 100-150w depending on your climate and a thermostat you should have a basking spot between 35-40c dependant on time of year and season, I would suggest investing in a dimming thermostat to keep the bulb last alot longer and save energy and keep the basking spot at a good temprature. Also i would advise giving them low level UBV such as an arcadia 6% bulb. Some people swear by keeping them without but there is some scientific evidence that the UVB they recieve from these is just as benificial as using D3 on top of there diet. For a happy skink its worth the extra provision in my opinion.

This is some additional research i have done for merauke Blue tounges in terms of where they are from and the conditions that acctually live in though there wild populations. This will give you a good idea of the tempratures they need during ther brumation periods.

Diet and nutrition

A blue tounge skink has quite a varied diet, you can just feed them Dog food but for the best results a mix of the below is required for a higher level of husbandry:

Babies/Juvinile Up to 1 year: (Feed between every 2-5 days 30-35g)

• High quality cat food (Non fish based)
• Dubia roaches
• Earthworms
• Crickets
• Snails
• Prickly Pears
• Watercress
• Rocket
• Squash

Adults over a 1 year: (Feed between every 7 days 30-35g) or occasionally every 10 days

• High quality Dog food (grain free,Non fish based)
• Dubia roaches
• Quail eggs
• earthworms
• crickets
• snails
• Prickly Pears
• Watercress
• Rocket
• Squash

The variation amount you should be aiming for is 50% veggies and 50% meats and proteins, 60:40 for juviniles. I would also suggest getting into a routine of weighing the skink a healthy adult should be in the range of 800-1000g although this is based on the average length and build and may be more or less for certain individuals. You can visually look for signs of obesity with the skink, they are quite bulky anyway and some of the indonesian ones like the merauke jaws are quite bulky anyway but the way to spot obesity is to look at the bulk under there jaws, excess skin bulk under there can be a sign of obesity. To reduce this slow there diet down and feed them smaller portions of feeding days.

Below are some of the Dog/cat food brands i have personally used and had sucess with please avoid any dog/cat food with any trace of fish as some fish sourced can contain high amounts of heavy metals such an mecury plus the fact that fish based cat and dog foods have a lot higher level of sodium that is not great for the skink overall.

Behaviours

Day and night Cycle

Common health issues

Obesity

• Respiritory infections

Cleaning

Cleaning a BTS enclosure can take a bit of time, you should spot pick any faeces when it appears in there enclosure and 

Brumation

Blue tonge skinks have a brumation period in winter and often will not eat much or at all for sustained periods of time this could be weeks to months during this period, this is noithing to worry about if your skink is a good weight and still looks healthy, In the heating and lighting section i go over there natural seasonal temprature varations which you can use as a guide to find there natuaral brumations pattern.

Avalability -

Blue tounge skinks are becoming quite common overall in the hobby, there are orthern blue tounges that are from autsralia and the indonisian blue tounges that have the subspecies such as the Merauke one. There are breeders of these around ive spotted them for sale 2-3 times in the last year along but any indonisian species is easy to find.

I reccomend to get one from a breeder or petshop as a baby or juvinile as the adults are dissapointingly being captured wild caught in indonesia which should not be condoned as they are abundant enough to sustain the demand.

a northern BTS which are on the more expensive end at £600+ but indonisian BTS are on the cheaper end starting at around £175 for a baby to the more sought after end like the Merauke at £300-400. I would recommend doing some additional research as i have read different locals can have different personalities.

References-

Gallery -

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