[nat228]

Hi, Im new to geckos although not to reptiles (already have a corn snake and a hermann tortoise) we came home from our local reptile store today with a Sandstone Gecko (having only gone in for frozen mice lol) and he/she has settled into its new viv nicely, and has eaten 2 locusts already but Im struggling to find any info on the web for this genus, and from what I can find it seems that it is a rare one to be kept in captivity but we were not told this when we bought it (we were told that it stays small, eats locusts and needs a basking light) I have found out for myself that it likes rock crevices to hide in, spends a lot of time off the ground as it's arboreal (sp?) and that it does bite when handled (found that one out the hard way lol) but thats about it. Does anyone keep these/have kept in the past, or know of an exsting care sheet for them. Its a gorgeous little thing and really want to take care of it as well as possible. Any info or advice would be greatly appreciated!

[acpart]

I don't know anything about this gecko either, but I have some suggestions to find out (I already did the first steps to see if it would get me anything):

--google "sandstone gecko" to find its Latin name (Gekko petricolus)
--do a search on these forums for "petricolus"
--read whatever you find and send a PM to people who keep them

Good luck and welcome to GU.

ALiza

[Ingo]

I do have 1,4,x of these. Originally, I started with 4 juveniles, which all turned out to be females and it then took me a year to find a male. This spring, I tried to put them all together and till now this works out fine. The females get along well with each other (not as for other species of the genus) and all are laying eggs. I now do have lots of them and also already some Babies.
As the name applies, this gecko is a sandstone dweller and thus you need a lot of fake rock surfaces in its tank. These should include deep crevices and overhanging areas, since these guys often sit upside down. They also avoid too rugged surfaces, the overall stone surface should be pretty smooth.
Relative humidity should be high in summer with some drop in winter.
To my knowledge, these geckos have not been imported since the eighties and there are very few breeders who help to keep them avauilable. The major problem with this species is the fact that there are much much more females in the offspring then males and that the prices are way too low to encourage more brreders.
That is a pity because its an extremely beautiful species which has not tendency to hide and in captivity can be seen active day and night.

Hope this helps

Best

Ingo

P.S.: It is often mixed up with gekko badenii (ex ulikovskii) which is much more present in the pet trade (but 90% wc, few breeders). So carefully check the identity of your lizard´.

[Elizabeth Freer]

Beautiful gecko !

[nat228]

Ingo, what do you feed your sandstone's on? and how often? we were told at the store that locusts or crickets are ok, and bought some locusts which both of my gecko's are eating great (we went back and bought the other sandstone gecko that was in the same viv as our first to keep them together) We put 4 locusts in earlier and 1 gecko (the newest) ate all 4 before the other got a look in! we put another 2 in to give the other gecko a chance, and it did get 1, but the new one ate the other again, so has had 5 locusts today. what is the norm? I read that crickets are better than locusts as a staple diet for geckos-is that true?

[Ingo]

I swear on variety.
In summer I mainly feed freshly caught field plancton to my geckos. Other feeder insects I use are crickets (3 species), Buffaloes, superworms, mealworms, firebrats, waxworms, rose beetle larvae and locusts.
I try to have an at least 2:1 ratio of hemimetabolic insects vs larvae of holometabolic insects since the latter do have a high fat content. I gutload all of my cb feeder insects with a calcium rich diet and dust all of them with a multivitamine/Mineral supplement. The field plancton I only dust every second week. My sandstone geckos also eat mashed fruit enriched with multivitamine/meineral supplements and of course I offe bird grit or crushed sepia shell..
They do not need much food: feeding 3-6 medium sized feeder insects per Gecke twice a week already is plenty for adults.
Hope that helps

Ingo

P.S.: Can you post pics of your geckos to secure the ID and sexing?