Tropical house gecko

File:Day 58 Tropical House Gecko (Hemidactylus mabouia) (53337214379).jpg, Kruger National Park, South Africa]]

The tropical house gecko has an average total length of {{Convert|10-12.7|cm}} (including tail){{Cite web |title=Tropical House Gecko - Hemidactylus mabouia |url=https://californiaherps.com/lizards/pages/h.mabouia.html |access-date=2024-06-30 |website=californiaherps.com}} and an average mass of {{Convert|4.6|g}}. Females are on average somewhat larger than males, with the male average snout-to-vent length (SVL) being {{Convert|51.56|mm|abbr=on}} and the female average SVL being {{Convert|54.47|mm|abbr=on}}.{{Cite web |last=Lennox |first=Bryan |date=2017 |title=Hemidactylus mabouia House gecko |url=https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Hemidactylus_mabouia/ |access-date=29 June 2024 |website=Animal Diversity Web |language=en}} Normally coloured in black and brown bands, this gecko can slowly change its colour based on its ambient temperature and lighting; its scales vary in colour from dark brown to light grey. The tropical house gecko bears particularly scaly lamellae on the underside of its toes, enabling it to grip onto vertical surfaces.

The diet of H. mabouia is varied, and includes animals such as isopods, centipedes, spiders, scorpions, cockroaches, beetles, moths, flies, mosquitoes,{{cite web|url=https://sta.uwi.edu/fst/lifesciences/sites/default/files/lifesciences/documents/ogatt/Hemidactylus_mabouia%20-%20African%20House%20Gecko.pdf|title=Hemidactylus mabouia (African House Gecko)|website=Sta.uwi.edu|access-date=28 March 2022}} snails, slugs, frogs, anoles, other geckos and blind snakes, with the most important element being Orthoptera species.{{cite web | url=https://www.reptilesofecuador.com/hemidactylus_mabouia.html | title=Tropical House-Gecko (Hemidactylus mabouia)}}Image:Tropicalhousegecko.jpg.]]

As with many gecko species, H. mabouia has the ability to vocalise. Its vocalisations range from quiet peeps to rapid short squeaking sounds.{{citation needed|date=June 2025}} The vocalisations may be heard most easily on a quiet night when sitting near an open window.

The tropical house gecko can be found predominantly in urban locations.

The tropical house gecko is mainly nocturnal and a voracious hunter of nocturnal flying and crawling insects. It has learned to wait near outside wall-mounted lighting fixtures so as to catch the insects that are drawn to the light.

In some Caribbean cultures it is considered good luck to have a tropical house gecko residing in one's home{{Cn|date=April 2025}}, and eats household insect pests. However, the faeces of the tropical house gecko are approximately {{convert|5|mm|in|abbr=on}} long, {{convert|2|mm|in|abbr=on}} wide, and dark brown (almost black) in colour. The gecko will usually confine its faeces to one area of a home, but this can present as a problem to humans if that area of the home happens to include a pale-coloured carpet, drapes, or any other easily stained surface. The stains are not easily removed, and the droppings have to be physically scooped up as well.{{Cite web|url=https://citybugs.tamu.edu/factsheets/household/misc-house/ent-2006/|title=House geckos|website=Citybugs.tamu.edu|access-date=29 March 2022}}

Despite actually being harmless, the common house gecko or "wood slave" is considered by some in Trinidad and Tobago to be a bad omen, and to have a poisonous touch{{Cn|date=April 2025}}

==References==

{{Reflist}}

• Boulenger, G.A. (1885). Catalogue of the Lizards in the British Museum (Natural History). Second Edition. Volume I. Geckonidae .... London: Trustees of the British Museum (Natural History). (Taylor and Francis, printers). xii + 436 pp. + Plates I–XXXII. (Hemidactylus mabouia, pp. 122–123).
• Duméril, A.M.C., and G. Bibron (1836). Erpétologie Générale ou Histoire Naturelle Complète des Reptiles, Tome troisième. [= General Herpetology or Complete Natural History of the Reptiles, Volume 3 ]. Paris: Librairie Encyclopédique Roret. iv + 517 pp. (Hemidactylus mabouia, pp. 362–363). (in French).
• Moreau de Jonnès, [A]. (1818). "Monographie du Mabouia des murailles, ou Gecko Mabouia des Antilles." Bulletin des Sciences par la Société Philomatique de Paris, Series 3, 5: 138–139. ("Gecko Mabouia", new species). (in French)
• Schwartz, A., and R. Thomas (1975). A Check-list of West Indian Amphibians and Reptiles. Carnegie Museum of Natural History Special Publication No. 1. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Museum of Natural History. 216 pp. (Hemidactylus mabouia, p. 124).

• [https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ruben_Regalado3/publication/252170251_Roles_of_Visual_Acoustic_and_Chemical_Signals_in_Social_Interactions_of_the_Tropical_House_Gecko_Hemidactylus_mabouia/links/580a5a9408ae74852b53031b.pdf]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20201108115908/https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2016/07/animals-science-geckos-reptiles-sticky/ Geckos May Be Famously Sticky, but Here's What Stumps Them]

{{Taxonbar|from=Q2703241}}

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Category:Hemidactylus

Category:Geckos of Africa

Category:Reptiles of Uganda

Category:Reptiles of the Caribbean

Category:Reptiles of the Dominican Republic

Category:Reptiles described in 1818

Category:Taxa named by Alexandre Moreau de Jonnès