varanus_enthusiast's Identifications

Found curled up in a small hollow in a cliff in Broome, West Australia. I thought it might be a snake but can't ID it, but maybe some kind of large lizard? Sorry not great photos, tricky to get close to!

There's a bit of a story to this one which is worth relating here.

I was descending along a sandstone escarpment when a lizard ran across in front of me, much larger than the skinks that were all around the place. When it got up a large dead eacalypt I saw it was a Goanna. As it climbed the tree I got out the camera.

Shortly after I noticed there was another slightly smaller one higher up on a limb of the same tree. The larger one watched me but was also looking up to the higher one. It then crouched down and crawled further up.

The one at the end of the branch seemed to look around and then suddenly jumped out. There weren't any other trees nearby. It kept its body and tail straight as it 'flew' through the air.

From the height of the launching point to the ground where it came down was a good vertical 7 to 8 metres. It didn't come down vertically though, instead going out at an angle. I thought it was going to hit some of the many small boulders there but instead hit the leaves of a small Croton arnhemicus, a shrubby large leaf bush.

It was a calculated jump and glide. The other (lower) Goanna then went into one of the hollows in the tree out of sight. I never anticipated a jump so unfortunately didn't get to take a photo of the Goanna in "mid flight".

Roadkill Black-headed Monitor
Identified as Varanus tristis on Bowerbird by Stephen Mahony: "A Black-headed Monitor. Identifiable by the dark colour, rows of spots and general pattern and appearance."