Part 14

No. 12: Four captures in 11 months, all within a 50-foot diameter, in 1951, on June 1 and 26, and August 27, and in 1952, on April 29.

No. 13: Four captures in 15 days, all in July 1949 within a 10-foot diameter.

No. 14: Four captures in 22 months, July 22, 1950 (as subadult), in 1951, on May 8 and June 5, and on May 13, 1952. Second location 295 feet southwest of first, third 30 feet north of second, and fourth 650 feet east of second and third. Probably two shifts of range were involved.

ADULT FEMALES

No. 1: Six captures in 26 months; in 1950 at the same place on June 4 and 13, in 1951 on May 26 it had moved from the original quarry ledge location 680 feet south southeast down the slope to the pond rock pile, where recaptured on June 9, and in 1952 on May 21 and July 22.

No. 2: Six captures at four locations all within a 25-foot diameter, in 13 months; June 5, 1950, and May 25, June 18, 26 and 29, 1952. On each occasion this female was hiding in a nest burrow, but she shifted to new nest sites as a result of disturbance by the investigator or flooding when there were unusually heavy rains.

No. 3: Five captures in 34 months, all within a radius of a few yards, at the pond rock pile, on August 8, 1949, June 5 and July 23, 1951, and May 15 and June 4, 1952.

No. 4: Four captures in 34 months, all within a radius of a few yards at the pond rock pile, on August 8, 1949, June 7, 1950, May 30, 1951 and May 21, 1952. It is notable that this female was taken only once in each of four different years, her occupancy of this rock pile seemingly continuing throughout the duration of the study.

No. 5: Four captures in two months, in 1950 on April 15, and on April 26 had moved 50 feet south; on May 23 she was approximately 50 feet from both second and third locations, and on June 5 was between second and third locations.

No. 6: Four captures in 23 months, all within a 20-foot stretch of ledge, in 1950 on June 5 and 17, in 1951 on August 22, and in 1952 on May 1.

No. 7: Four captures in one year, in 1951 on May 19, June 12, June 24, and in 1952 on May 21, all four locations within a 15-foot diameter.

No. 8: Four captures in 23 months, in 1950 on July 5 (as a subadult), in 1951 on August 6 and 15, and in 1952 on May 28, all within a radius of a few yards at the pond rock pile.

No. 9: Four captures in 13 months, on August 2 and 3, 1951, and May 28 and August 31, 1952. From the original location successive sites were 30 feet southwest, 20 feet south southwest, and 30 feet north.

YOUNG

No. 1: (male) Five captures in 33-1/2 months; marked as hatchling on July 13, 1949, and recaptured on June 1, 1950, 175 feet northwest down slope. Subsequent locations of this lizard, as an adult, were, in 1951, on August 21 and 24, and 1952 on May 1, 80 feet east, 80 feet east, and 70 feet northeast from the second location.

No. 2: (male) Five captures in a little more than one year, all within a radius of a few yards at the pond rock pile, in 1949 on August 23, and in 1950 on June 7, July 23, August 19, and September 3.

No. 4: (male) Four captures in 11 months all within a 30-foot stretch along the ledge, in 1950 on July 4, and in 1951 on May 6, 14, and 25.

No. 5: (male) Four captures in one year, in 1950 on September 4, and in 1951 on May 11, June 14, and August 21; the first and last locations were together separated from the second and third, also together, by about 20 feet.

No. 6: (male) Four captures in 13 months, in 1950 on April 19, June 5 and June 6, and in 1951 on May 14. All four locations were linearly distributed along the ledge, the second and third near together 30 feet north of the first and the fourth 30 feet south of the first.

No. 7: (sex undetermined) Four captures in one month, on April 24, and May 2, 4, and 21, 1952, well scattered within a 70-foot diameter.

No. 8: (female) Eight captures in 25 months, in 1950 on June 5 and 9, and in 1951 on May 25, August 15, and September 28, and in 1952 on April 24 and 26. All were within a 150-foot diameter, the first three all within 40 feet, the fifth and sixth near together but 35 feet north northeast from the first group, the last three all within a 90-foot diameter and all to the north of the first five. At least one shift probably was involved.

No. 9: (female) Five captures in 28 months, in 1950 on April 21 and May 7, in 1951 on May 3, and in 1952 on May 2 and August 27. The first three captures were all at approximately the same location, from which the fourth was 60 feet north and the fifth was 130 feet east.

No. 10: (female) Five captures in 24 months; in 1950 on June 5 and 13, and July 29, in 1951 on August 21, and in 1952 on May 28. From the original location successive captures were 50 feet west, 35 feet west northwest, 40 feet west, and 50 feet west.

Less complete records of the movements of other individuals are included along with growth data, on pages 79 to 82 and 87 to 88.

Sizes of home ranges are affected by the type of habitat. For instance, the pond rock pile approximately 70 x 30 feet, must have constituted the entire home range for the many individuals living in it, since it was surrounded by areas that did not provide suitable habitat. No less than 212 five-lined skinks were taken in this small rock pile area in four seasons, and it is obvious that many of these were occupying it simultaneously since a substantial proportion of the total were caught there in more than one year. This rock pile provided in particularly concentrated form the essential habitat requirements, such as an abundant and varied arthropod food supply, an almost infinitely large number of hiding places beneath and between the rocks, basking sites, and flat rocks with damp soil beneath, suitable for nests. In open woods home ranges tend to be larger or, at least, more elongate. Scattered distribution of such habitat features as flat rocks and outcrops, stumps, logs, and glades with patches of sunlight, may induce an individual to extend its activities over a more extensive area. For some of the adult males for which largest numbers of records are available, showing repeated movements back and forth within a definite area which seemingly constituted a home range, movements of 275 feet, 225 feet, 170 feet, 165 feet, 150 feet and 130 feet, respectively, have been recorded. For one young which grew to the size of a subadult during the period covered by the records, movements within a 150-foot diameter were recorded. These individuals all had home ranges substantially larger than the average. It seems that in the five-lined skink there is no fixed size or shape for a home range, but that it varies within rather wide limits depending on age, sex, and perhaps individual peculiarities and on the presence and distribution of essential habitat features within the general area.

Most of the young that were recaptured had grown to subadult or adult size, so that the movements they made as young cannot be separated from those made when they were full grown or nearly so. For 40, however, recapture records are available while they were still less than 56 mm. long. One of those was an exceptionally long movement of 215 feet, obviously involving a shift of range. For the other 39, the average movement was 34 feet, almost intermediate between the average movements of adult males and females. Observations on recently hatched young have given the impression that they keep to narrowly limited areas probably only a few yards in extent at first. For instance, at various times several members of a brood of young have been observed foraging simultaneously but independently on the same 10-foot log, within a few feet of each other. For periods of up to more than a week they had failed to disperse any farther than this from the nest, although probably never returning to the nest itself after having left. In subsequent weeks, however, the young are likely to shift their activities from the immediate vicinity of the nest site to more favorable nearby areas, and gradually extend their ranges. By the time they are one-fourth grown they are ranging over areas larger than those used by adult females.

Some of the shifts in range are probably forced upon individual skinks by changes in seasonal distribution of food, shelter and other requirements, causing them to abandon certain areas and invade others by gradual stages, without venturing far, at any time, into unfamiliar surroundings. Occasional individuals apparently get lost and undergo a period of wandering before they re-establish a home range. An individual venturing slightly beyond the border of its home range might lose its orientation and fail to return, especially if it left under conditions of stress, as when pursued by an enemy, or a rival of its own species. Several individuals originally captured in the vicinity of the quarry or nearby ledges, were subsequently recaptured at the pond rock pile more than 200 yards away. In these instances it may be that the lizard wandered from its home range along the ledge, and finding itself in thick woods, with nearly continuous canopy permitting insufficient sunlight, and with few rocks for shelter, it continued down the slope to the lower edge of the woods, crossed a ditch, and a 100-foot stretch of grassland, and finally reached the exceptionally favorable habitat provided by the rock pile.

The extent to which memory persists through the season of dormancy is little known, but great change takes place in the habitat during the colder half of the year when the lizard's activity is suspended. Even if the area is one that is free from gross disturbance by man or large animals, the changes occurring are so great that the area might be scarcely recognizable from the lizard's viewpoint. Herbaceous vegetation mantling the soil, at the height of its development in late summer, will have died, dried out and the leaves and stalks will have been matted down by wind, rain, and snow, and incorporated in the surface layer of soil by the next spring. Shrubs and trees having shed their leaves, present contours quite different from those in autumn. Holes and crevices familiar as avenues of escape, will have been sealed, by the weather collecting and compacting surface debris. Less extensive changes are involved in the occasional blowing down of trees and dead snags, erosion of gullies, deposition of sediment and drift wood, and disintegration of logs. Many of the invertebrates which are the main food sources in late summer, are unavailable in early spring, being at different stages in the life cycle or annual cycle of abundance; and those kinds which make up the bulk of the spring diet likewise are often unavailable in fall. These changes in location of food supply, shelter, and other needs, and the seasonal change in microhabitat, breaking the established routine of conditioned responses to habitat features would seem to promote shifts in range after emergence from hibernation. The available records tend to bear out this supposition. Of the 15 skinks recorded as making long movements of more than 250 feet that almost certainly involved shift in range, only one was recaptured the same season; the other fourteen had passed one or more hibernations.