Evolution has been caught in the act. Scientists have discovered a group of yellow bellied three toed skinks in colder areas of Australia have more or less abandoned egg laying and are now giving live birth.towards live birth.
Their counterparts in warmer areas of Australia continue to use eggs as a means of reproduction.
From the National Geographic:
Along the warm coastal lowlands of New South Wales, the yellow-bellied three-toed skink lays eggs to reproduce. But individuals of the same species living in the state’s higher, colder mountains are almost all giving birth to live young.
Only two other modern reptiles—another skink species and a European lizard—use both types of reproduction.
Read the entire article at the National Geographic.