Hemiphyllodactylus aurantiacus (Beddome, 1870)

Agarwal, Ishan, Khandekar, Akshay, Giri, Varad B., Ramakrishnan, Uma & Karanth, K. Praveen, 2019, The hills are alive with geckos! A radiation of a dozen species on sky islands across peninsular India (Squamata: Gekkonidae, Hemiphyllodactylus) with the description of three new species, Organisms Diversity & Evolution (New York, N. Y.) 19 (2), pp. 341-361 : 349

Hemiphyllodactylus aurantiacus is known only from the vicinity of Yercaud, Salem District , Tamil Nadu .

Natural history

Hemiphyllodactylus aurantiacus was described from an elevation of ~ 1200 m ( Beddome 1870) and other localities are also in and around Yercaud (~ 1200–1600 m) ( Beddome 1870; Bauer & Das 1999; Ganesh & Arumugam 2015). We encountered the species after dark along low stone walls in Grange Resort, Yercaud (~ 1390 m) in high abundance, with over 25 specimens encountered in about an hour of search. The vegetation in the Shevaroys varies from scrub at the foothills, transitioning to deciduous forests at middle elevations with evergreen forests on parts of the plateau ( Jayakumar et al. 2009).