Hemidactylus garnotii

Taxobox | name = Indo-Pacific Gecko
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
classis = Reptilia
ordo = Squamata
subordo = Sauria
familia = Gekkonidae
genus = "Hemidactylus"
species = "H. garnotii"
binomial = "Hemidactylus garnotii"
binomial_authority = Duméril & Bibron, 1836

Indo-Pacific Gecko or Garnot's House Gecko "Hemidactylus garnotii" is a species of gecko.

Description

Snout obtusely pointed, longer than the distance between the eye and the ear-opening, 1.5 to 1.6 times the diameter of the orbit; forehead slightly concave; ear-opening small, rounded. Body and limbs moderate. A slight but distinct fold of the skin along the flanks, and another bordering the hind limb posteriorly. Digits free or with a very slight rudiment of web, moderately dilated, inner well developed; infradigital lamella oblique, 6 or 7 under the inner digits, 10 to 12 under the fourth finger, and 11 to 14 under the fourth toe. Upper surfaces and throat covered with minute granular scales, a little larger on the snout; abdominal scales moderate, imbricate. Rostral subquadraugular, with median cleft above; nostril pierced between the rostral and three nasals; 12 or 13 upper and 9 to 11 lower labials; mental large, triangular, in contact posteriorly with a pair of pentagonal chin-shields, followed by a second smaller pair; the anterior pair of chin-shields in contact with the first infralabial, and with each other mesially; the posterior pair separated from each other, and also completely or nearly completely from the labials. Tail depressed, flat beneath, with sharp denticulated lateral edge; the scales on the upper surface very small, equal; those on the lower surface larger, imbricate, with a median series of large, transversely dilated plates. Brownish grey above, uniform or with more or less distinct brown and whitish spots; lower surfaces uniform whitish. [Boulenger, G. A. (1890) Fauna of British India. Reptilia and Batrachia.]

From snout to vent 2.3 inches; tail 2.6.

A parthenogenetic species. [Kluge, A.G. & Eckardt, "Hemidactylus garnotii" Duméril & Bibron, a tripoid, all-female species of gekkonid lizard. "Copeia" 1969 (4): 651-664]

Distribution

Sikkim, Burma, Malay Peninsula and Archipelago, South Pacific Islands.

NE India (Darjeeling, Assam, Sikkim), Nepal, Bhutan,Thailand, Myanmar (= Burma), Malysian Peninsula, S China (Hong Kong, Guangdong, Hainan, S Yunnan), Taiwan,Philippine Islands, New Zealand (introduced), Indonesia (Sumatra, Nias, Borneo, Java), New Caledonia, Loyalty Islands, Polynesia, Fiji, Western Samoa, Introduced into USA (Hawaii, Florida) and the Bahamas.

Type locality: "l'Ile de Taiti [=Tahiti, French Polynesia] "

Notes

References

* Crawford, Daniel M.; Somma, Louis A., 1993 "Hemidactylus garnotii" (Indo-Pacific gecko)". USA: Florida Herpetological Review 24 (3): 108-109
* Meshaka, Walter E., Jr., "Hemidactylus garnotii". "Herpetological Review" 26 (2): 108
* Stoliczka, F., "Notes on new or little-known Indian lizards". "Proc. asiat. Soc. Bengal" (Calcutta) 1871: 192-195

External links

* [http://www.embl-heidelberg.de/~uetz/ EMBL reptile database]