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This is one of over 1,000 species of gecko. Geckos, are native to Southeast Asia. However, being small, fast and great hiders with the ability to climb virtually any surface, they learned early to stow away on ships and now they live in North America, East Africa and Northern Australia.
When fully grown, they vary in size from about 7-15 cm. They also vary substantially in color, from nearly translucent to mottled brown.
The tail that saved the day
Geckos have many other unique adaptations, such as the ability to 'drop' their tails. This is a predator-avoidance reflex that often saves their lives. Should a predator, such as a bird, catch a gecko by the tail the gecko can simply shed it. The sudden detachment stimulates the nerves in the tail, which make it wriggle feverishly. The ruse leaves the bird satisfied with at least a morsel of a meal while the little gecko scampers for cover. Amazingly, the tail always grows back, but it isn't uncommon to see a tailless gecko - evidence that he has had a recent close encounter!
House geckos have a lifespan of up to 5 years and breed generally between May and August. They lay clutches of 2 soft eggs which quickly harden which have a sticky coating that enables them to lay their eggs in cracks in walls, under logs or occasionally in large leaves. As with most geckos, they have mating rituals and courtship rituals, and the males often fight.
They are pretty smart, too. Instead of hunting insects, gecko stations themselves near a bright light and let the unwitting insects come to them. Next time you see a gecko, observe its wonderful behavior for a while. They truly are remarkable and highly entertaining animals.
The most striking ability of a gecko is its ability to climb virtually anywhere on almost any surface. How geckos achieved such a feat baffled scientists for generations. Want to know how they could hang from any surface vertical or even horizontally upside down? It took the powerful electron microscope to reveal the little gecko’s top secret. Geckos have up to 500,000 tiny hair-like structures, called setae, on each foot. Each microscopic setae has 100 and 1,000 spatulae or rounded ends. The structures are so minute that they can grab onto the hundreds of crevices in the smoothest surfaces, even glass. The discovery was so amazing that industry is trying to invent synthetic setae for a new generation of boot. A gecko's foot has at least a half a million microscopic hairs (one-tenth the thickness of a human hair). The end of each hair is split into even much smaller hairs. At the frayed ends these smaller hairs have mushroom shaped cap structures suction cup called setae on the end- there are almost 500,000 setae on each foot and total about a billion per gecko. Source: Dennis Kunkel Microscopy, Inc. Nanotechnology isn't just for researchers and scientists… no, it's also something that geckos came up with long before we got our brains wrapped around the idea. If a gecko stuck every single little setae sticker to a surface at one time it could hold up a 250 lb man! If you take the time to observe their behavior, they even appear to pounce on insects while 'standing' upside down! Very impressive but, of course, its feet don't actually leave the ceiling or it would crash to the floor!
Unfortunately they freak off almost all ladies as well as men…….
Their tendency to jump out suddenly from no where, leap off from ceiling on to dinning table any time they feel like to, peeping from window or ceiling when we are bathing or when we are changing, making a lot of noise middle of the night, It’s cold, soft, slender body run over our feet, their droppings are at every corner in the house i.e.: the kitchen, on the wall, on our books, TV, bed, paintings and on our food too! The list goes on……
Want to get rid of gecko?
RIDSECT LIZARD REPELLENT : This product contains no pesticide nor toxic chemical. Its formulation consist of superior pharmaceutical nano-tech particles which makes it suitable and safe to be used anywhere indoor or outdoor. It repels and does not kill the lizard and each treatment can lasts up to 6 weeks.
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