In the late afternoon, my sister Mary noticed these skinks scurrying about in the ground cover near the ocean beach. They were very active, and each time I tried to sneak up on one that was temporarily in an open area, it would nervously dash off into the vegetation.

Here is a list of all the reptiles and frogs I saw on this 2007 trip to Madagascar.

I spotted this largeish skink holding a position just off the trail on our first hike in Ankarana. I expected to see a bunch of them, but I didn't see another skink in Ankarana. I did see some skink-like Zonosaurus tsingy though.

It's nearly impossible to tell Mabuya gravenhorstii from Mabuya elegans. The two main differences are that M. gravenhorstii reaches a larger size, and has a slightly different arrangement of scales on the top of the head. I didn't get a photo that shows the head scales clearly, but this individual was large enough that I think it's probably M. gravenhorstii.

We were staying at a lodge/hotel/whatchamacallit named Jardin Vanille on Nosy Komba, right on a beautiful beach on the Mozambique Channel. From the beach up into the rainforest, piles of huge boulders make for a dramatic landscape. Various lizards patrol the boulders, including these skinks, some big Zonosaurus madagascariensis, and at least one large gray gecko that kept scuttling away before I could get close enough to photograph or even identify it.

I didn't see any of these skinks in the forest proper at Anjozorobe, but there was a healthy population around (and in some cases inside) the lodge.

Here is a list of all the reptiles and frogs I saw on this 2023 trip to Madagascar.

Someday, when Trachylepis gravenhorstii is split into two dozen species, I will be happy I took all these pictures in different parts of Madagascar.

Wandering around near our lodge one morning, I spotted a pile of broken rock from some long-aborted construction project, and assumed correctly that I might find some basking lizards there.

I was hoping this might be some species other than the very common and widespread Trachylepis gravenhorstii, but unfortunately I couldn't come up with any reason to believe that.