There are 123 currently recognized species of reptiles and amphibians to be found in New Zealand. Of these, an astonishing (well, it was to me, at least) 64 are of the family Scincidae – the skinks. All but one of these – the introduced and now established Rainbow Skink – are of the genus Oligosoma and are endemic. With the island’s geckos (all species of which are also endemic), this remarkable assortment of skinks comprises the entirely of the lizard species to be found in Aotearoa.
Dylan Van Winkel, Marleen Baling, and Rod Hitchmough present every single species of all of these, along with the island’s frogs, marine turtles, marine snakes, and the Tuatara, in their new Princeton Field Guide to the Reptiles and Amphibians of New Zealand. Lavishly illustrated with over 400 color images, as well as distribution maps, identification keys, and generous (each species is given at least two full pages) amount of textual information, this new field guide is the the first book to include all of New Zealand’s reptile and amphibian species.
(Note bene – While Reptiles and Amphibians of New Zealand will be officially published for sales in North America by Princeton University Press on 25 February 2020, it was originally published for sales in the UK by Bloomsbury in late 2019.)
