Red Star News reporter learned from the Chengdu Institute of Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences that recently, the amphibian and reptile research team of the Chengdu Institute of Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences described a new species of gecko gecko - Gekko jinjiangensis sp. nov. HOU, SHI, WANG, JIANG and XIE, 2021。 The new species belongs to the Gekko japonicus species group of geckos in the genus Gecko, and the research team described the new species in terms of morphology, phylogeny, and habitat.
Jinjiang gecko
It is understood that this species is found in the dry and hot river valley at the junction of Sichuan and Yunnan in the middle section of the Jinsha River, and is currently the highest known species of gecko (2476m). The study was recently published in The Asian Herpetological Research, 2021, The leading international amphibian and herpetological journal Asian Herpetological Research, No. 1, 2021. The study was funded by the Second Comprehensive Scientific Expedition to the Tibetan Plateau (2019QZKK05010503) and the Biodiversity Survey and Assessment Project of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment (2019HJ2096001006).
Located in the mountainous region of southwest China, the Jinsha River Basin is one of the hotspots of biodiversity and one of the most concentrated and vulnerable areas of forest ecosystems in the Yangtze River Basin.
From 2019 to 2020, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment commissioned the Chinese Academy of Environmental Sciences to organize and carry out a biological amphibian and reptile survey project in the priority area of Hengduanshannan. Led by Xie Feng, a researcher at the Chengdu Institute of Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the team conducted a two-year survey in the Shaluli Mountain area. On August 27, 2019, when the team surveyed the southern part of Batang County in Sichuan Province, using an atlas to visit local Tibetan villagers and investigate amphibian and reptile clues, the villagers suddenly became interested in gecko photos and said that domestic cats caught a lot of these animals at night. This attracted the attention of the expedition team, and several geckos were subsequently found at night on the rock wall of the stream in front of the hometown. Later, several individuals were found in Derong County. Almost at the same time, a qinghai-Tibet plateau expedition led by researcher Jiang Jianping also found the gecko in the Jinsha River Valley in Deqin, Yunnan.
The living environment of the Jinjiang gecko
Phylogenetic analysis using mitochondrial ND2 gene fragments showed that the Gecko is an independent evolutionary branch and is sister to Gekko scabridus. The genetic differentiation between the Jinjiang gecko and the coarse warty gecko was remarkable, and the genetic distance of ND2 was 9.9%-12.2%.
Gekko Laurenti, 1768 belongs to the reptile reptile Reptilia, the suborder Lacertilia of the order Squamata, and the gecko family Gekkonidae, which are mainly distributed in tropical and subtropical Asia and western Oceania. It is mainly distributed in subtropical and tropical areas south of the Qinling Mountains, and there are fewer species in the north. According to the existing literature statistics, there are currently 77 species of geckos, and there are 19 species distributed in China, of which 12 species are endemic.
Jinjiang gecko orthodontic specimen (CIB5334220115, male)
This species is currently the highest known global distribution of geckos species (2000–2476m), according to the survey of the species in the past two years, its distribution range is concentrated in the dry and hot valley of the Jinsha River, the encounter rate is high, mostly inhabit the valley between shrublands and stone crevices, and it has also been found on buildings, and the females found are far more than males. Since the larvae born in August have been seen, it is speculated that the breeding period is from May to June.
The discovery of the Jinjiang gecko provides an important model for studying the radiation diffusion mechanism of geckos species with tropical and subtropical distribution to the Tibetan Plateau.
Red Star News reporter Peng Xiangping
Edited by Guan Li
According to the Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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