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Hemiergis gracilipes (STEINDACHNER, 1870)

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Higher TaxaScincidae, Sphenomorphinae (Sphenomorphini), Scincoidea, Sauria, Squamata (lizards)
Subspecies 
Common NamesE: South-western Mulch-skink 
SynonymHinulia gracilipes STEINDACHNER 1870: 342
Lygosoma australis GRAY 1839: 332 (non Tiliqua australis GRAY 1838)
Sphenomorphus gracilipes — COGGER 1983: 184
Glaphyromorphus australis — STORR et al. 1999
Glaphyromorphus gracilipes — COGGER 2000: 495
Glaphyromorphus gracilipes — COUPER et al. 2006: 381
Hemiergis gracilipes — MECKE et al. 2009
Hemiergis gracilipes — REEDER & REICHERT 2011
Hemiergis gracilipes — DUNAYEV 2025 
DistributionAustralia (Western Australia)

Type locality: Rockhampton.

australis: neotype locality: Albany, W. A., designated by Storr (1967). Original type locality "Australia”.  
Reproductionovoviviparous 
TypesSyntypes: NMW (= NHMW) 10140, 10141:1-2, donated Steindachner, 1870 (Tiedemann et al., 1994). Fourth syntype not found (Cogger et al. 1983).
Neotype: WAM R24980, designated by Storr 1967 [australis] 
DiagnosisUnfortunately we had to temporarily remove additional information as this was scraped by multiple AI companies who sell that data. These details, e.g. detailed descriptions are available for collaborators and contributors. Please contact us if you need any of this material. 
CommentSynonymy after COGGER 1983.

Tiliqua australis Gray, 1838 and Lygosoma australis Gray, 1839, were both placed in the genus Lygosoma by Boulenger (1887), who erroneously treated Tiliqua australis as the junior secondary homonym. While it can be argued that Lygosoma australis has never been formally rejected as a junior homonym and therefore is available and has priority over Hinulia gracilipes Steindachner, 1870, under Article 59 of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature we have arbitrarily treated Lygosoma australis Gray, 1839 as a junior secondary homonym of Tiliqua australis Gray, 1838, rejected prior to 1961 (see Loveridge 1934) [fide COGGER 1983: 184].

Limb morphology: 5 digits, 5 toes (Singhal et al. 2018, Brandley et al 2008) 
EtymologyPresumably named after the Latin gracilis (slender) plus pes (foot), referring to the slender, long-toed feet of this elongate skink. (G. Shea, pers. comm., 9 Feb 2024) 
References
  • 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.
  • 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
  • Dunayev E. A. 2025. The Godeffroy Trading House and its exhibits in the herpetological collection of the Zoological museum of Moscow University. [in Russian] Current Studies in Herpetology 25 (1–2): 22- - get paper here
  • Gemel, R.; G. Gassner & S. Schweiger 2019. Katalog der Typen der Herpetologischen Sammlung des Naturhistorischen Museums Wien – 2018. Ann. Naturhist. Mus. Wien, B 121: 33–248 - get paper here
  • Gray,J.E. 1839. Catalogue of the slender-tongued saurians, with descriptions of many new genera and species. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 2 (11): 331-337 [continued from page 293] - get paper here
  • Greer A E 1985. A new species of Sphenomorphus from northeastern Queensland. Journal of Herpetology 19 (4): 469-473 - get paper here
  • Loveridge, A. 1934. Australian reptiles in the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool. Harvard 77: 243-383 - get paper here
  • Mecke, S; Dougherty, P. & Donnellan, S.C. 2009. A new species of Eremiascincus (Reptilia: Squamata: Scincidae) from the Great Sandy Desert and Pilbara Coast, Western Australia and reassignment of eight species from Glaphyromorphus to Eremiascincus. Zootaxa 2246: 1-20 - get paper here
  • Reeder, T.W. 2003. A phylogeny of the Australian Sphenomorphus group (Scincidae: Squamata) and the phylogenetic placement of the crocodile skinks (Tribolonotus): Bayesian approaches to assessing congruence and obtaining confidence in maximum likelihood inferred relationships. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 27: 384–397 - get paper here
  • Reeder, Tod W and Jennifer D Reichert 2011. Phylogenetic Relationships within the Australian Limb-Reduced Lizard Genus Hemiergis (Scincidae: Squamata) as Inferred from the Bayesian Analysis of Mitochondrial rRNA Gene Sequences. Copeia 2011 (1): 113-120. - 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
  • Steindachner,F. 1870. Herpetologische Notizen (II). I. Reptilien gesammelt Während einer Reise in Sengambien. II. Über einige neue oder seltene Reptilien des Wiener Museums. Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, 62: 326-349, plates I-VIII - get paper here
  • Storr, G. M.; L. A. Smith, and R. E. Johnstone 1999. Lizards of Western Australia. I. Skinks. Revised Edition. Western Australian Museum
  • Storr,G.M. 1967. The genus Sphenomorphus (Lacertilia, Scincidae) in Western Australia and the Northern Territory. Roy. Sco. West. Aust. 50 (1): 10-20
  • Wilson, S. & Swan, G. 2010. A complete guide to reptiles of Australia, 3rd ed. Chatswood: New Holland, 558 pp.
 
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