Tachygia microlepis (Tonga Ground Skink)

[sebbe67]

Tachygia microlepis
sometimes also called Tongan giant skink

The Tongan Giant Skink was a large lizard found on the island of Tonga. About 40cm long, it probably fed mainly on insects and snails. By the 1820s the species was on the verge of extinction, probably because of habitat loss. In 1827 a scientist found two specimens - the last ever seen.

[sebbe67]

www.megacom.net/~arkones/yowie/yffb27.html

here is a pic of this very rare lizard, the only known painting that exsist of this species.

[sebbe67]

cool.jschina.com.cn/discuz/attachments/D50-A_Gap_in_Nature-Index_02_ldtq2Y8cqLDa.jpg

[another specialist]

gap in nature

Thanks sebbe67 for pointing out that i uploaded wrong pic = did it in error but been corrected now.

[sebbe67]

Tachygia microlepis

The Giant Skink of Tonga was a magnificent creature that slipped into extinction befory anything was known about it except the fact it existed. Just two specimens survive, both pickled in alcohol in the Museum National d,Histoire Naturelle, Paris, where they have lain for nearly two centuries.

They were collected by naturlists Jean Rene Quoy and Joseph Paul Gaimard on a voyage round the world between 1826 and 1829.

The timming and cause of their extinction is entirely unknown.

Source: A Gap in Nature

[another specialist]

Jean René Constant Quoy (November 10, 1790 - July 4, 1869) was a French zoologist.

Along with Joseph Paul Gaimard he served as naturalist aboard La Coquille under Louis Isidore Duperrey during its circumnavigation of the globe (1822-25), and the Astrolabe (1826-1829) under the command of Jules Dumont d'Urville. During this voyage they discovered the now extinct giant skink of Tonga Tachygia microlepis.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Ren%C3%A9_Constant_Quoy

[Sebbe]

Tachygyia, the giant Tongan skink: extinct or extant?

repository.si.edu/bitstream/handle/10088/4538/Ineich_Zug1996-TachygiaTonga.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Ineich, Ivan; Zug, George R. 1996. Tachygyia, the giant Tongan skink: extinct or extant?. Cryptozoology 12: 30-35.

[Peter]

Conservation: Apparently extinct (Ineich and Zug 1996). The first and only record of this Tongan lizard is from the early nineteenth-century report of the L’Astrolabe expedition (Dumont d’Urville 1832) when they were discovered.

reptile-database.reptarium.cz/species?genus=Tachygyia&species=microlepis
Uetz, P., Freed, P. & Jirí Hošek (eds.). (2016). The Reptile Database, www.reptile-database.org, accessed 27 December 2016.

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Dumont d'Urville, J. (1832). Voyage de la Corvette L'Astrolabe éxécuté par ordre du Roi, pendant les années 1826-1827-1828-1829, sous le commandement of M. J. Dumont d'Urville, Capitane de vaisseau. Publié par Ordonannce de Sa Majesté. Histoire du Voyage. Tome Quatrième. Part I. J. Tastu, Paris.

[Peter]

A large terrestrial, likely semifossorial, skink (Tachygyia microlepis) is presumably extinct (Ineich and Zug 1996). The first and only record of this Tongan lizard is from the early nineteenth-century report of the L’Astrolabe expedition (Dumont d’Urville 1832) when they were discovered. During the expedition’s around-the-world scientific exploration, it spent a month on Tongatapu in 1827 and brought two specimens back to Paris. This large, reduced-limbed lizard was described subsequently as Eumeces microlepis by Duméril and Bibron (1839) and has never been seen again in the Islands, hence known only by the two syntypes.

George R. Zug, Ivan Ineich, Gregory Pregill, and Alison M. Hamilton (2012). Lizards of Tonga with Description of a New Tongan Treeskink (Squamata: Scincidae: Emoia samoensis Group). Pacific Science, 66(2):225-237.
www.researchgate.net/publication/280989251_Lizards_of_Tonga_with_Description_of_a_New_Tongan_Treeskink_Squamata_Scincidae_Emoia_samoensis_Group

[surroundx]

Ineich, Ivan and Böhme, Wolfgang. (2024). Was it premature to declare the giant Tongan Ground Skink Tachygyia microlepis extinct? Salamandra 60(1): 82-93.

[Melanie]

Feb 24, 2024 8:42:03 GMT surroundx said:

Ineich, Ivan and Böhme, Wolfgang. (2024). Was it premature to declare the giant Tongan Ground Skink Tachygyia microlepis extinct? Salamandra 60(1): 82-93.

I hope they will rediscover this species.

[Melanie]

The Giant ‘Grey Ghost’ Lizard Went Extinct 100 Years Ago–Or Did It?

www.forbes.com/sites/scotttravers/2024/04/28/the-giant-grey-ghost-lizard-went-extinct-100-years-agoor-did-it/?sh=15fbc0842bfd