Hemidactylus benguellensis BOCAGE, 1893
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Hemidactylus benguellensis
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| Higher Taxa | Gekkonidae, Gekkota, Sauria, Squamata (lizards: geckos) |
| Subspecies | |
| Common Names | E: Benguela House gecko G: Benguela Hausgecko |
| Synonym | Hemidactylus platycephalus — BOCAGE 1873: 209 [part] Hemidactylus longicephalus — BOCAGE 1873: 210 [part] Hemidactylus benguellensis BOCAGE 1893: 115 Hemidactylus benguellensis — BOCAGE 1895: 12 Hemidactylus bocagii — BOCAGE 1895: 1 Hemidactylus benguellensis — MONARD 1937: 52 Hemidactylus mabouia — LOVERIDGE 1947: 170 Hemidactylus mabouia — LOVERIDGE 1957: 185 [part] Hemidactylus mabouia — HELLMICH 1957: 34 Hemidactylus benguellensis — FRADE 1963 Hemidactylus longicephalus — BRANCH 1998: 234, pl. 89 Hemidactylus mabouia — FRÉTEY & BLANC 2002: 22 Hemidactylus longicephalus — GRIFFIN 2003: 42 Hemidactylus longicephalus — HERRMANN & BRANCH 2013: 98 Hemidactylus cf. longicephalus — RÖSLER 2015: 10 Hemidactylus longicephalus — CERÍACO et al. 2016: 54 Hemidactylus benguellensis — MARQUES et al. 2018: 184 Hemidactylus benguellensis — BRANCH et al. 2019: 315 Hemidactylus benguellensis — BUTLER et al. 2019: 232 Hemidactylus benguellensis — BAPTISTA et al. 2019 Hemidactylus benguellensis — CERÍACO et al. 2020: 27 |
| Distribution | Angola (Benguela, Namibe, Huila), Namibia Type locality: “Cahata” [= Caota], Benguela Province, Angola. Neotype locality: N’Dolondolo (- 13.81328°, 13.13618°, 682 m elevation), Namibe Province, Republic of Angola. |
| Reproduction | oviparous |
| Types | Neotype: CAS 263540 (field number AMB 10304; Fig. 8; Table 4), adult male, collected by Luis M.P. Ceríaco, Suzana Bandeira and Ishan Agarwal on 21 November 2016. Original syntypes lost, was MBL, specimen numbers not known (collector J.A. d’Anchieta)”, destroyed by fire 18 March 1978. |
| Diagnosis | Diagnosis: A medium sized Hemidactylus, maximum snout-vent length 54.5 mm (Fig. 7 in Ceriaco e tal. 2020). Dorsal pholidosis heterogeneous, with 13–18 irregularly arranged longitudinal rows of subtrihedral, striated, strongly keeled tubercles at midbody. Two well-developed pairs of postmentals, the inner pair longer than the outer pair. ventrolateral folds distinct, about 25–34 scale rows across venter. Five to seven divided scansors beneath first digit of both manus and pes, six to seven beneath fourth digit of manus, eight to nine beneath the fourth digit of pes. Males with 23–33 continuous precloacal-femoral pores. Original tail roughly cyclotetragonal, strongly spinose; scales on the tail slightly larger than dorsals of body, striated, imbricate, with a longitudinal series of two enlarged, strongly keeled, striated, pointedtubercles on either side of the median dorsal furrow. Subcaudal scales small and imbricate, about one fifth of tail width. Body dorsum with a series of dark-brown “W-shaped” transverse markings from occiput to sacrum; enlarged dorsal tubercles orangish; tail with distinct alternating light and dark bands. |
| Comment | Synonyms: LOVERIDGE 1947 synonymized Hemidactylus benguellensis with H. mabouia. Marques et al. 2018 “tentatively” considered Hemidactylus benguellensis as valid and Ceriaco et al. 2020 formally revalidated it. |
| Etymology | Named after the type locality. |
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