Stowaway

Meet Lenny. He's about 4-1/2" of lizardly leanness, sort of a toasty-brown color with orange highlights. He has a prominent light-tan stripe down the middle of his back, with darker stripes along his sides. He's quick as lightning. He's a Southeastern Five-Lined Skink, Eumeces inexpectatus.

There are lots of his type hanging around Florida, and they're all very good at nabbing flies, mosquitos and other high-protein insects. For some reason Lenny chose The Fox as a home base while we were in Stuart. Every so often we'd find him perched atop a fender, or down below, frantically scrambling around the V-berth hunting critters to eat. Living in our V-berth was suboptimal for all concerned parties so I caught him in a jar and repatriated him to shore with admonishments to stay away from the boat and mind his own business. I worried that he was out of his element aboard The Fox and wondered why he didn't stay up by the parking lot in all that insect-infested landscaping. I thought my lecture hit home with him because I didn't see him for several days afterwards.

Eventually we left Stuart for Fort Pierce, Florida; after one night at anchor we headed to sea. Sure enough, when we were the furthest offshore we'd be on this passage to Brunswick, Georgia, Lenny suddenly reappeared. Clearly upset, he ricocheted around the cockpit for a while, then finally hid inside the crevices of our outboard that's mounted on the stern pulpit. That's where you see him in that photo up there. He made himself scarce for most of the day, occasionally peeking out to make sure I wasn't waiting for him with another jar. He gradually settled down enough to hunt. I happened to be looking in his general direction at the moment he captured and ate a moth that was twice the size of his head. I was very impressed: Try swallowing a whole watermelon without chewing or using your hands, and you'll have an idea of little Lenny's mad skillz.

We were still about 5 hours from landfall when Lenny got comfortable enough to leave shelter and bask on the cockpit coaming. He stretched, and began exploring the piles of nearby jib sheets and halyards. Then something amidships caught his eye and he took off along the side deck.

We made landfall and anchored that night in the Brunswick River, then tied up at Brunswick Landing Marina the next morning. I haven't seen Lenny. Hope he made it ashore and brought some ID with him - Georgia has some very strict anti-immigration laws.


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