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Eulamprus tympanum (LÖNNBERG & ANDERSSON, 1915)

IUCN Red List - Eulamprus tympanum - Least Concern, LC
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Higher TaxaScincidae, Sphenomorphinae (Sphenomorphini), Scincoidea, Sauria, Squamata (lizards)
SubspeciesEulamprus tympanum marnieae HUTCHINSON & RAWLINSON 1995
Eulamprus tympanum tympanum (LÖNNBERG & ANDERSSON 1915) 
Common NamesE: Cool-temperate Water-skink, Highland Water Skink 
SynonymLygosoma tympanum LÖNNBERG & ANDERSSON 1915
Sphenomorphus tympanum — COGGER 1983: 188
Sphenomorphus tympanum — GREER 1983
Eulamprus herseyi WELLS & WELLINGTON 1985 (fide SHEA & SADLIER 1999)
Sphenomorphus tympanum — HENLE & OSBORNE 1986
Eulamprus tympanum — COGGER 2000: 789
Eulamprus tympanum — COUPER et al. 2006: 380
Eulamprus tympanum — WILSON & SWAN 2010

Eulamprus tympanum marnieae HUTCHINSON & RAWLINSON 1995
Eulamprus tympanum marnieae — WILSON & SWAN 2013 
DistributionAustralia (New South Wales, South Australia, Victoria), Tasmania

Type locality: ". . . said to have been collected in the neighbourhood of Melbourne. . . ", Vic. (fice COGGER 1983)  
Reproductionovoviviparous. Embryos of the actively thermoregulating ovoviviparous skink Eulamprus tympanum are subject to temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD), offering the mother the chance to select the sex of her offspring and a mechanism to help to balance sex ratios in wild populations (Robert & Thompson 2001). 
TypesHolotype: NRM (NHRM) 3094
Holotype: NMV D52921, adult male [marnieae] 
DiagnosisDiagnosis: A water skink lacking any trace of longitudinal dorsal striped pattern, with a pale anterior margin to the ear opening, usually 42 or fewer midbody scale rows and without transversely oriented dark dorsal markings (Hutchinson & Rawlinson 1995: 192)


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CommentDistribution: see map in Pepper et al. 2018: Fig. 2.

Limb morphology: 5 digits, 5 toes (Singhal et al. 2018, Cogger 2014)

Subspecies: Pepper et al. 2018 found no genetic support for the separation of E. t. marnieae although they did not explicitly suggest synonymization.

Reference images: see Uetz et al. 2024 for high-resolution reference images for this species. 
EtymologyPresumably named after the Latin tympanum (drum), referencing the prominent tympanic membrane in this species. (G. Shea, pers. comm., 9 Feb 2024) 
References
  • Biazik, Joanna M.; Michael B. Thompson, and Christopher R. Murphy 2010. Paracellular and transcellular transport across the squamate uterine epithelium. Herp. Cons. Biol. 5 (2) - get paper here
  • Cogger, H. G. 2014. Reptiles and Amphibians of Australia, 7th ed. CSIRO Publishing, xxx + 1033 pp. - get paper here
  • Cogger, H.G. 2000. Reptiles and Amphibians of Australia, 6th ed. Ralph Curtis Publishing, Sanibel Island, 808 pp.
  • Cornejo-Páramo, Paola; Duminda S B Dissanayake, Andrés Lira-Noriega, Mónica L Martínez-Pacheco, Armando Acosta, Ciro Ramírez-Suástegui, Fausto R Méndez-de-la-Cruz, Tamás Székely, Araxi O Urrutia, Arthur Georges, Diego Cortez 2020. Viviparous reptile regarded to have temperature-dependent sex determination has old XY chromosomes. Genome Biology and Evolution, , evaa104, - get paper here
  • Couper, P., Covacevich, J., Amey, A. & Baker, A. 2006. The genera of skinks (Family Scincidae) of Australia and its island territories: diversity, distribution and identification. in: Merrick, J.R., Archer, M., Hickey, G.M. & Lee, M.S.Y. (eds.). Evolution and Zoogeography of Australasian Vertebrates. Australian Scientific Publishing, Sydney, pp. 367-384
  • Doughty, Paul; Shine, Richard & Lee, Michael S.Y. 2003. Energetic costs of tail loss in a montane scincid lizard. Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part A 135: 215–219 - get paper here
  • Greer, A.E. 1983. On the adaptive significance of the reptilian spectacle: the evidence from scincid, teiid, and lacertid lizards. in A.G.J. Rhodin and K. Miyata (eds), Advances in Herpetology and Evolutionary Biology. Mus. Comp. Zool., Massachusetts; 725 pp. [pp. 213-221.] - get paper here
  • Henle, K. & Osborne, W. S. 1986. Herpetologische Spaziergänge im Kosciusko-Nationalpark/Australien. Herpetofauna 8 (40): 28-33 - get paper here
  • Hutchinson, M.N & P.A. Rawlinson 1995. The water skinks (Lacertilia: Eulamprus) of Victoria and South Australia. Records of the South Australian Museum 28(2): 185–207
  • Hutchinson, M.N. 1979. The reptiles of Kinglake National Park. Victorian Naturalist 96: 124-134 - get paper here
  • Lönnberg, E. & Andersson, G. L. 1915. Results of Dr. E. Mjöberg's Swedish Scientific Expeditions to Australia 1910-1913. VII. Reptiles collected in northern Queensland. Kungl. Svenska Vetensk. -Akad. Hand]. 52 (7): 1-9 - get paper here
  • Pepper, Mitzy; Joanna Sumner Ian G. Brennan Kate Hodges Alan R. Lemmon Emily Moriarty Lemmon Garry Peterson Daniel L. Rabosky Lin Schwarzkopf Ian A. W. Scott Glenn Shea J. Scott Keogh 2018. Speciation in the mountains and dispersal by rivers: Molecular phylogeny of Eulamprus water skinks and the biogeography of Eastern Australia. Journal of Biogeography 45: 2040– 2052 - get paper here
  • Rawlinson, P.A. 1969. The reptiles of East Gippsland. Proc. R. Soc. Vict. 82: 113-128
  • Robert, K.A. & M.B. Thompson 2000. Influence of Feeding on the Metabolic Rate of the Lizard, Eulamprus tympanum Copeia 2000 (3): 851-855. - get paper here
  • Robert, K.A. & M.B. Thompson 2007. Is Basking Opportunity in the viviparous lizard, Eulamprus tympanum, compromised by the presence of a predator scent? Journal of Herpetology 41 (2): 287-293. - get paper here
  • Robert, KYLIE A. & THOMPSON, MICHAEL B. 2001. Sex determination: Viviparous lizard selects sex of embryos. Nature 412: 698 - 699 - get paper here
  • Singhal, Sonal; Huateng Huang, Maggie R. Grundler, María R. Marchán-Rivadeneira, Iris Holmes, Pascal O. Title, Stephen C. Donnellan, and Daniel L. Rabosky 2018. Does Population Structure Predict the Rate of Speciation? A Comparative Test across Australia’s Most Diverse Vertebrate Radiation. The American Naturalist 192 (4): 432-447 - get paper here
  • Skinner, Adam; Mark N. Hutchinson, Michael S.Y. Lee 2013. Phylogeny and Divergence Times of Australian Sphenomorphus Group Skinks (Scincidae, Squamata). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 69 (3): 906–918 - get paper here
  • Stewart, James R. and Tom W. Ecay 2010. Patterns of maternal provision and embryonic mobilization of calcium in oviparous and viviparous squamate reptiles. Herp. Cons. Biol. 5 (2) - get paper here
  • Swan, G.; Sadlier, R.; Shea, G. 2017. A field guide to reptiles of New South Wales. Reed New Holland, 328 pp.
  • Uetz, P.H.; Patel, M.; Gbadamosi, Z.; Nguyen, A.; Shoope, S. 2024. A Reference Database of Reptile Images. Taxonomy 4: 723–732 - get paper here
  • Wilson, S. & Swan, G. 2010. A complete guide to reptiles of Australia, 3rd ed. Chatswood: New Holland, 558 pp.
 
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