Skink pheromones

Cooper W.E. Jr. (1995). Effects of estrogen and male head coloration on chemosensory investigation of female cloacal pheromones by male broad-headed skinks (Eumeces laticeps). Physiol Behav 58, 1221-1225. 

LIZARD PHEROMONES BEHAVIORAL RESPONSES AND ADAPTIVE SIGNIFICANCE IN SKINKS OF THE GENUS EUMECES... 

In this article, we review a research program on pheromonal communication in three congeneric skinks. The major emphases have been on social discriminations based on chemical cues, including choice of mates and agonistic opponents, on selective forces underlying the evolution of pheromonal communication (especially sexual selection), and on the anatomical site of pheromone production. 

All three North American representatives of the fasciatus group are differentially responsive to chemical stimuli arising from conspecifics. Operationally, these lizards can discriminate members of their own species from their most closely related congeners solely on the basis of chemical cues. They appear to identify skinks as conspecific or heterospecific, but there is no evidence that they make any distinctions among heterospecific congeners pheromonally. 

These preliminary observations intimated that the skinks could not only identify conspecifics by species-identification pheromones, but might also identify sexual partners and/or sexual competitors by some combination of sex and species-identification pheromones. 

Male skinks in the fasciatus group could discriminate conspecific from heterospecific females by differences in urodaeal pheromones. 

Cooper, W.E. W.R. Garstka. 1987. Lingual responses to chemical fractions of urodaeal glandular pheromone of the skink, Eumeces laticeps. J. Exp. Zool. 242 249-253. 

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