A new species of lizard found in India's Western Ghats

By Vara B. Giri.

May 2008. A distinctive new species of ground-dwelling lizard (gecko) of the genus Hemidactylus has been discovered on the plateaus of the Satara district in Maharashtra, India. 

At present this species is only known from the type locality, which lies in the south-central part of the Western Ghats of Maharashtra. This region has some unique habitat of large basaltic plateaus on the crests of mountains, surrounded by semi-evergreen forest valleys. Most of the plateaux support sparse vegetation, which thrives during the monsoon, but in summer they are barren. These plateaux have a unique floral and faunal diversity.

Western Ghats

The northern Western Ghats, especially the parts in Maharashtra, are relatively unexplored and there is little information regarding the amphibians and reptiles of this region. In the last four years three new species of amphibians have been discovered from Maharashtra. All these new discoveries were the result of localised surveys with moderate search efforts. With intensive and systematic surveys it should be possible to further increase our knowledge of reptiles of the northern Western Ghats. In Maharashtra, there are excellent examples of the highly diverse and intact Western Ghats forests, but in the Satara district the forest is more fragmented and is increasingly degraded by human exploitation. Though herpetologically unexplored, the occurrence of a new ground dwelling Hemidactylus highlights the uniqueness of this region. As this area has large expanses of plateaus, efforts are now being made to confirm the occurrence of this species from other likely areas.

This new species has been discovered by Mr. Varad B. Giri of the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), Mumbai and Dr Aaron M. Bauer of Villanova University, USA. Their paper was published in the Journal "Zootaxa" in February 2008.

Courtesy of Varad B. Giri, of the Herpetology Section of Bombay Natural History Society of Mumbai.