Plestiodon elegans is a reptile more common in southern China, spreading westward from Yunnan to north from Sichuan to southern Henan. Because of its juvenile and sub-adult body has a bright blue tail, it is named "blue tail". However, this beautiful blue tail is not only for good looks, but more importantly, it is used to distract predators from attacking their heads and bodies. Blue-tailed dragons have the function of cutting themselves, and when necessary, they will cut off their tail to attract the attention of predators and quickly escape.
Blue-tailed Stone Dragon Image Source: Jiang Zhiwei
Blue-tailed dragon is highly adaptable to the environment, and its distribution area is low mountains below 2,500 meters above sea level, generally inhabiting under stones or grasses, preferring to move in sunny and dry areas with higher temperatures, and will quickly escape when encountering danger. There is a dormant phenomenon in low temperatures.
Image source: Jiang Zhiwei
The blue-tailed dragon is generally within 250 mm in length, and the length of the tail is usually 1.5 times the length of its head. Juveniles and sub-adults will have a blue tail, the back is black and has five golden longitudinal lines extending to the base of the tail, but after the adult these two features will disappear, the adult male's back color will become gray or grayish brown, and there will be irregular red spots on the head and body sides, while the female will maintain the gold line and blue tail for longer than the male, and the adult body color will appear blue-gray. It feeds on insects and small terrestrial crustacean arthropods, and breeds in oviparous mode, and females have juvenile protection behaviors.
Blue-tailed stone dragon is also called Liwen stone dragon or five-line stone dragon, but strictly speaking, the five-line stone dragon should refer to the Bestiodon inexpectatus living in North America, which is very similar in form to the blue-tailed stone dragon. There are also several kinds of stone dragons in China that are morphologically similar to blue-tailed stone dragons, such as yellow-veined stone dragons (P. capito), four-line stone dragon (P. quadrilineatus), P. chinensis）。
Plestiodon inexpectatus from the United States Image source: Jacob Loyacano