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| Hemidactylus kangerensis
Mirza, Bhosale & Patil, 2017
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A new large species of gecko superficially resembling Hemidactylus maculatus Duméril & Bibron and its allied large Hemidactylus is described from Eastern Ghats. The new species, Hemidactylus kangerensis sp. nov. can be easily distinguished from members of the H. maculatus complex based on the number of femoral pores, i.e. 18–21 on each side, separated medially by 4 non-pored scales. A phylogenetic analysis based on partial sequence of mitochondrial gene cytochrome b shows that the gecko is a member of the “H. prashadi” clade and is sister to H. maculatus, from which it differs in an uncorrected pairwise sequence divergence of 10%. The discovery of a new large gecko from Eastern Ghats advocates the need for biodiversity assessment across the neglected Eastern Ghats.
Keywords: Hemidactylus maculatus; India; New species; Species complex; Taxonomy; mtDNA; cyt b
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| Fig. 7. Hemidactylus kangerensis sp. nov. coloration in life, paratype female BNHS 2487.
Photo: Zeeshan Mirza.
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Systematics
Hemidactylus kangerensis sp. nov.
Hemidactylus maculatus Sanyal & Dasgupta 1990: 18; Ingle 2003:2
Hemidactylus subtriedrus Sanyal & Dasgupta 1990: 18–19; Javed et al., 2009: 368 (in part)
Hemidactylus cf. maculatus Mahony 2009: 60–61; Javed et al., 2011: 10 (in part)
Hemidactylus sp. Agarwal et al., 2011: 36; Mirza & Sanap 2014: 16 (in part)
Etymology: The species is named after Kanger Valley National Park, where the type locality is located.
Suggested common name: Kanger valley rock gecko.
Zeeshan A. Mirza, Harshal Bhosale and Rishikesh Patil. 2017. A New Large Species of Gecko of the Genus Hemidactylus Oken, 1817 (Reptilia: Sauria: Gekkonidae) from the Eastern Ghats, India. Comptes Rendus Biologies. In Press. DOI: 10.1016/j.crvi.2017.09.003
Mangaluru: New species of gecko found in Eastern ghats - Bangalore Mirror bangaloremirror.indiatimes.com/news/state/mangaluru-new-species-of-gecko-found-in-eastern-ghats/articleshow/61093359.cms @bangaloremirror