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Cnemaspis leucura KURITA, NISHIKAWA, MATSUI & HIKIDA, 2017

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Higher TaxaGekkonidae, Gekkota, Sauria, Squamata (lizards: geckos)
Subspecies 
Common NamesE: Curse Rock Gecko 
SynonymCnemaspis leucura KURITA, NISHIKAWA, MATSUI & HIKIDA 2017
Cnemaspis leucura — KURITA et al. 2024 
DistributionMalaysia (Borneo: Sarawak)

Type locality: Gunung (= Mt.) Penrissen, Padawan, Kuching District, Sarawak, Malaysia, 01°07'21" N, 110°13'43" E, 1035 m elevation.  
Reproductionoviparous. Gravid females with two eggs in the oviducts were collected in February and at the end of August. Cnemaspis leucura might reproduce all year round or have a long reproductive season, perhaps due to the stability of annual climate in the area. 
TypesHolotype: SRC 00022, Adult male, (Sarawak Research Collections), Forest Research Center Sarawak (collected on 21 February 2012 by T. Hikida. Paratypes (Fig. 4). Two adult females (SRC 00021, on 19 February 2012; SRC 00329, on 12 March 2013) by K. Nishikawa from the type locality, and three adult males (KUHE 57421, 57423, and 57424) and one adult female (KUHE 57422) on 31 August 2016 by T. Kurita from Kampung (= Village) Sadir, Padawan, Kuching District, Sarawak, Malaysia (1°06'25.128" N, 110°16'27.678" E, 180 m a.s.l.). 
DiagnosisDiagnosis: Cnemaspis leucura, a medium sized Cnemaspis, differs from all other Southeast Asian species of Cnemaspis in having a dark-yellow head and a gray trunk with dark-yellow upper flanks in adult males. It differs from all other species of Cnemaspis except C. paripari, C. mumpuniae Grismer et al., 2014, C. peninsularis Grismer et al., 2014, and C. roticanai Grismer & Chan, 2010 in having a yellow regenerated tail in adult males, and also differs from the four species in that posterior one-half of original tail in males is white, with black blob dorsally. It differs further from all other species in the unique combination of the following characters: SVL up to 62.7 mm; 10–13 supralabial scales; 9–11 infralabials; 0–2 (mostly 1) internasals; 4–7 postmentals; head, ventral, forearm, tibial, subcaudals, and dorsal tubercles keeled; 24–31 paravertebral tubercles between limb insertions, not linearly arranged; no or a few tubercles on flank; discontinuous rows of 4–9, pore-bearing, precloacal scales with round pores, separated at the midline by 2–4 poreless scales, in adult males; no femoral pores; 3–8 postcloacal tubercles on each side; slightly enlarged, submetatarsal scales beneath first toe; 27–34 subdigital lamellae on fourth toe; tubercles present within lateral caudal furrow at least anterior part; ventrolateral, caudal tubercles present anteriorly; an enlarged, smooth, median row of subcaudals; a pair of large, round, black spots in shoulder region; amorphous, pale spots in middorsal trunk; thin, yellow (male) or white (female), transverse markings on flanks; anterior one-half of tail black, with very faint gray bands on dorsal side.


Additional details (1907 characters) are available for collaborators and contributors. Please contact us for details. 
CommentHabitat: surface of sandstone boulders and outcrops in primary dipterocarp forest. The surface of boulders were wet from spray from waterfalls (Figs. 5B, C). Cnemaspis leucura was exclusively found on the rock surface and, in the case of Kampung Sadir, all individuals of Cnemaspis on tree trunks were C. kendallii.

Sympatry: Cyrtodactylus pubisulcus, C. consobrinus

Abundance: only known from its original description (Meiri et al. 2017). 
EtymologyThe specific epithet leucura is from the Greek leukos and oura, meaning white-tailed, referring to white subcaudal color on the posterior part of tail in the male holotype. The generic name is feminine in gender. 
References
  • KURITA, T., NISHIKAWA, K., HOSSMAN, M. Y., MIZUNO, T., SATO, H., & GUMAL, M. 2024. Description of a new sandstone-dwelling species of genus Cnemaspis (Sauria: Gekkonidae) from Gunung Santubong National Park, southwestern Sarawak, Malaysia. Zootaxa 5468(2): 361-378 - get paper here
  • KURITA, TAKAKI; KANTO NISHIKAWA, MASAFUMI MATSUI, TSUTOMU HIKIDA 2017. A new species of Rock Gecko genus Cnemaspis (Squamata: Gekkonidae) from Western Sarawak, Malaysia. Zootaxa 4258 (6): 525–538 - get paper here
  • Meiri, Shai; Aaron M. Bauer, Allen Allison, Fernando Castro-Herrera, Laurent Chirio, Guarino Colli, Indraneil Das, Tiffany M. Doan, Frank Glaw, Lee L. Grismer, Marinus Hoogmoed, Fred Kraus, Matthew LeBreton, Danny Meirte, Zoltán T. Nagy, Cristiano d 2017. Extinct, obscure or imaginary: the lizard species with the smallest ranges. Diversity and Distributions - get paper here
  • Nguyen, H.N., Hung, C., Yang, M. et al. 2020. Sympatric competitors have driven the evolution of temporal activity patterns in Cnemaspis geckos in Southeast Asia. Sci Rep 10: 27 - get paper here
 
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