11003-97115 Tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus) portrait of head at sunset. Stephens Island *
11003-97116 Tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus) portrait at sunset. Stephens Island *
11003-97108 Tuatara (Sphenodon punctatus) on Stephens Island, often 'share' burrows with fairy prion, although the relationship is distinctly one-sided. Stephens Island tuatara contribute to around a 28% failure of all prion eggs laid, either through direct predation, through interference by causing desertion or the exclusion of breeding parents from the nesting chamber, or by the direct predation of chicks. On this male tuatara, tiny endemic mites (Neotrombicula sphenodonti) are just visible as scarlet patches around the reptiles eyelid. Stephens Island *
