Many hundreds of species of lizard inhabit mainland Papua New Guinea, including an astounding diversity of over 100 species of skink. Illustrated on these pages are a few examples - mainly species from lower montane habitats in the central mountain chain. There are numerous undescribed lizard species in PNG, and doubtless many, many more new discoveries to be made in remote areas.

See also ... Lizards of SE Asia

Encounters with skinks in PNG are often just fleeting glimpses of small, dark, slender lizards which flee from any disturbance, however close-up photography reveals a huge diversity of forms, many of which remain undescribed in scientific literature. Determining the species of a skink based solely on photographs is very difficult : most of the species illustrated below are only tentatively assigned to their genus.