the dance of the brown skink

Another hike at my local, neighborhood state forest.  While I was egrossed in studying a beat up ole live oak.

I heard a ruslting in the leaves.  I couldn't see what it was so I moved closer and found a pair of brown skink doing a dance.  Maybe the dance.
 

First they would approach and posture up  . . .  closer and closer until their urge to fight was irresistable.

Wow! they were tangling (tangoing) so fast you couldn't even see it.

They would land - disoriented -  figure out where they were and  . . .


 Then they would go back to the posturing part of the dance.


and again tangle. . . .  in the unending dance. 

I felt like I took too many pictures and spent too much time with these little guys so I moved on to bigger but not necissarily better things. (like the otter)

The whole experience reveals several insights to me: First, that small things can facinate as much as big ones.  Second, I get distracted easily.  And third,  I need to start taking video because the pictures somtimes just doesn't cut it when the dance is on.