He’s back. (Lens-artist photo challenge : Patterns.)

We haven’t seen our resident bluetongue lizard for 2-3 months. They are cold-blooded reptiles and at the onset of winter, all bluetongues enter a dormant phase, called “brumation”,  though this is not a true hibernation. On the warmest winter days they may come out to bask for short periods but no feeding takes place.

Then today on my morning stroll around the garden I saw him sunning on his regular rock. Jack rushed off to bring him some meat. I had gone round the garden looking for “patterns” as this is the theme from Leya for this weeks “Lens-artists photo challenge”. How perfect is this… The lovely combination of browns, creams, fawns and that tinge of rust. Notice how the colours blend with the rock. Look at his tiny leg, when he is warmed up he can slither quite quickly under the rock. I tried to catch his tongue, it is quite long, but the camera was not fast enough, this was all I caught of that bright blue tongue.

Thank you Bluey for turning up today…