The squeaky gecko is a tiny lizard: in adults, the length of the body with the tail is no more than 9 cm, while the body accounts for about 4 cm.
Description
The base of the tail, neck and torso of the animal are covered with granular scales on top. Among it, slightly convex, rounded, slightly ribbed or smooth scales stand out for their larger sizes. They do not form regular transverse rows. The distance between individual tubercles exceeds the diameter of the tubercle. Very fine throat scales. Geckos, photos of which are presented in this article, have plates in the lower part of the fingers, on the free edge, without denticles or ribs.
Color
A gecko squeaky on top of a sandy ocher hue. A strip of dark brown color extends from the upper labial first shield through the eye on each side of the muzzle. Such bands can merge with each other on the back of the head, thereby forming a horseshoe-shaped pattern. Between the eye and the nasal aperture, the stripes are edged from above with a light shade line, while in the interval between the upper side of the muzzle to the space between the orbits there is a dark brown vague pattern. From the lower back to the nape across the body there are 4-7 dark brown stripes.
Age-related variability and sexual dimorphism
Sexual dimorphism in the squeaky gecko manifests itself in larger sizes of females in comparison with males. In females, the anal pores are less developed and can almost completely disappear with age. Some body proportions are also subject to age-related variability. Young individuals of this species are shorter-tailed. In young animals, the diameter of the eye is greater than the length of the body. The values of these indices in mature individuals become more uniform.
Squeaky gecko is common in Kazakhstan and Central Asia. Outside our country - in southern Mongolia, northern Afghanistan, northeastern Iran and further to northern China.
Habitat
The squeaky gecko (a photo of this lizard can be carefully considered in the article) is a typical inhabitant of semi-desert, penetrating in places deep in the steppe, where it still adheres to areas of semi-desert type. It is mainly found on the slopes of small hills, which are covered with finely and coarse clastic material, sometimes on gravelly-clay plains.
Cases of penetration of the animal on the outskirts of the sand are known. All its stations are characterized by sparse vegetation, which consists of tasbiyurgun, baby boar, wormwood, teresken, undersized cereals and hodgepodge. Settles under limestone slabs on cliffs, on almost bare gravelly-clay plains, as well as on the outskirts of saxaul thickets.
Behavior
The gecko’s shelters are burrows of burrowing animals, cracks and cracks in the soil, spaces under stones, voids and hollows in the basal part of saxaul. With the onset of darkness, the animal leaves the shelter, but in cloudy weather it can be found in the afternoon. It can publish a metal lingering squeak, which is easy to confuse during the day with the voice of a bird. Goes to winter in October. Spends the night in search of food near his refuge.
An interesting feature of these lizards is their very loud “singing”, as well as a huge set of different sounds that accompany their life activities all the time: croaking, tweeting, clicking, squeaking.
The squeaky gecko (interesting facts about his life are given in this article) moves during the period of activity by short dashes, bending and raising the body high. It can easily move along vertical surfaces, but it, however, avoids them. Does not go far from his shelters. They hunt insects at the entrance of holes and crevices, and run after the stones one after another. In animals, summer shelters are spaces under slabs and stones, saxaul voids, cracks in the soil, crevices of stone artificial structures, vertebral burrows. They hibernate in crevices and burrows.
Activity
The squeaky gecko, whose photo shows it in all its glory, is active at temperatures up to 25 ° C. In the afternoon, they hide in safe shelters. Marked in cloudy weather on the surface.
The squeaky gecko feeds mainly on insects, among them butterflies, caterpillars, small beetles, orthopterans, bugs, dipterous, cicadas, spiders, ants, phalanges and scorpions predominate. In the stomachs of animals, beetles, spiders, caterpillars and butterflies, bugs and ants predominate in frequency of occurrence.
Breeding
Geckos reach puberty with a total body length of up to 28 millimeters. According to collection materials, the sex ratio is approximately 1/1. Mating takes place in late April. At the end of May, the laying of eggs begins and lasts until the very end of June. The female lays several times one at a time, sometimes 2 eggs each, the average size of which is 6 X 9 mm. In July, young individuals begin to appear. At the age of twenty months, maturity sets in, in other words, in the second spring after birth.
Rates of growth
Cubs that have just hatched from eggs have a trunk length of about 18 mm. By the end of the activity season, they (without a tail) reach a size of 24 mm, which means that individuals of the first generation can take part in active reproduction for the next year. This population type is characterized by the presence of 4 age groups, the oldest of which at the same time includes representatives of three years and older.
Reasons for the decline in numbers
The squeaky gecko has several enemies. Among them, magpie can be distinguished. Another reason for the reduction in the number of lizards is the drying up of the Aral Sea, which entailed a deviation of the coast line from the cliffs by several kilometers. This, in turn, caused a sharp decrease in the number of invertebrates. In addition, it should be noted that geckos are displaced from their biotopes during plowing.
Similar species
The squeaky gecko differs from the carapace in that on its surface the tubercles do not create longitudinal rows, and the presence of tubercles from smooth.
