I found a wild GDG colony

[Leester]

Hello everyone, My family and I went to the Florida Keys for Lobster season. The house we rented has a colony of Giant Day Geckos all around the house and garage. I've counted roughly 18 different geckos from neonate to adult...... Amazing! According to Florida Fish and Wildlife Dept. Wild colonies only exist on 3 different Islands, supposedly introduced to an area restaurant by a herpetologist who wanted to breed them in the wild and sell the babies to pet stores..... They really are here, I lucked out, gonna bring a few home to watch and study. My son also caught a baby iguana, for his unused 30 gal. fish tank........ We only got 10 lobster during the two day mini season....

The first big male i caught was eating a baby giant day gecko... the little one's tail was hanging out of his mouth..... Later we fed a medium GDG a 1" baby Chinese house gecko..... she stalked and pounced on it in a small clear transport container appx. 12x6x6 (peanut-butter pretzel snacks).

Any advice well be much appreciated

I now have 2 juveniles 3" & 4" and 2 adults 6" & 8".... can't tell sex yet:biggrin:

 

[Leester]

Since I captured these outside, shouldn't I be keeping these outside. We only live 2 hours north of the Florida Keys in Cape Coral. Weather is basically the same?!?!?!? Maybe during the dryer colder months, ill bring them in. Is anyone living in Florida keeping geckos outside with great results? thanks
Lee

 

[markpulawski]

Yes I keep mine outside most of the year, inside my pool screen, I only brought them in for 7 or 8 nights last winter. Almost all of these offered on Kingsnake and the like come out of the keys, caught in places like where you stayed.

 

[NicKtheGreeK1997]

Herpetologists like these should be hanged by a rope. Anyway, I'm not a fan of wild geckos being kept in captivity, but that's not the issue right now. I don't know about Phelsuma care, but here are my beliefs: first of all you should read many care sheets to make sure you have happy geckos. Afterwards these are WCs, which means they need a vet visit for parasites removal. Also, prey items other than insects and fruits aren't a healthy diet for geckos, so you shouldn't have fed the house gecko. You can get CGD or day gecko diet, but they should always be able to eat insects. I don't know if you could even breed crickets or roaches for so many geckos. My advise is to learn about them, buy all the required equipment and then keep one or two. The above I said should apply on the iguana too. You don't have to keep an animal just to fill your tank.

 

[markpulawski]

Herpetologists like these should be hanged by a rope. Anyway, I'm not a fan of wild geckos being kept in captivity, but that's not the issue right now. I don't know about Phelsuma care, but here are my beliefs: first of all you should read many care sheets to make sure you have happy geckos. Afterwards these are WCs, which means they need a vet visit for parasites removal. Also, prey items other than insects and fruits aren't a healthy diet for geckos, so you shouldn't have fed the house gecko. You can get CGD or day gecko diet, but they should always be able to eat insects. I don't know if you could even breed crickets or roaches for so many geckos. My advise is to learn about them, buy all the required equipment and then keep one or two. The above I said should apply on the iguana too. You don't have to keep an animal just to fill your tank.

I agree Nick, releasing a species like this non native to the Keys could have disasterous results but it is also completely irresponsible. There was a lady here in Sarasota that released several Tokay geckos to rid herself of **** roaches, now there is a healthy population outside of downtown Sarasota...who knows what this would do to native reptiles? Though the cuban brown anoles here have taken over everyhwere, it's so nice to occaisionally see the nice bright green native anoles, a rare sighting these days.
I would comment though that I don't have a problem with people collecting these non natives, they should not be here anyway.

 

[Aimless]

yah. I think the guy who released them was irresponsible. I personally don't have an issue with anyone collecting these guys.

I wanted to comment on diet - Nick, I've kept Phelsuma. you don't have to have bugs always available. you can feed the powdered stuff regularly and do bugs sometimes (more often for growing juveniles, less as they age). also, bug eaters are carnivores...feeding a house gecko is not unhealthy, providing you don't do it so often your gecko gets fat and the feeder lizards you're using are, themselves, parasite-free. obviously they eat them in the wild just fine. an occasional treat as part of a varied diet isn't going to hurt the gecko, and possibly they enjoy the hunt?

 

[daggekko]

I have mixed feelings about this. It is irresponsible. No doubt. I don't believe that everyone should be allowed to collect and sell them as they please though. The populations in the keys could end up being a safety population incase anything ever happened to natural populations. Similar to P guimbeaui being released in Hawaii. That being said, capturing them for the hobby responsibly and in limited #'s is a great thing too. Keeps from needing to get them from madagascar(if anyone actually still does).


Very nice find anyhow!!! I am going to plan a trip to the keys in the next year or so. I do want to catch some(but release them) just so I can say I found and caught them!:biggrin:

 

[NicKtheGreeK1997]

daggekko, introducing foreign species to an area can make the local species to move or disappear. Here, it happened with res, american bullfrogs, mosquitofish and sunfish. It's messed up.
You don't need colonies all over the world to protect them from extinction. A law enforcement can stop most WC outports.
The issue now is that we need someone to catch them and rehome them or send them back to madagascar, if that's possible.

 

[Aimless]

sending them back to Madagascar would be foolish. they may carry different parasites and/or pathogens that you would simply be introducing to Madagascar.

 

[Bamma]

Grandis are more common than is wide reported. The places that are known (like Grassy Key) see collecting and still have Grandis year to year. But they have been reported on at least total of 4 different keys (Islands). I heard in Hawaii there have been problem with collectors moving Jacksons Chamelons to other areas to make collecting easier.
Tim Adams

 

[NicKtheGreeK1997]

aimless I didn't think of it. Anyway, they will have to be removed from that area.

 

[Bamma]

Anyway, they will have to be removed from that area.

They can't get rid of the Pythons, Iguanas, Tegus, Basilisk, Tokays, Brown Anoles and many more non-natives, so I don't think there is any chance to get the all the Grandis.
Tim Adams

 

[waynek]

unfortunately man has been introducing non-native species everywhere man has travelled as long as we have existed. for better or worse we bring plants,animals,insects bacteria and viruses with us everywhere. some are harmful to local populations and some are not. once introduced i would imagine it to be very hard if not impossible to eradicate the introduced flora and fauna. every part of this country has plants or animals that were introduced that harm the native populations.

 

[BryanF]

Here's a link to a paper describing the invasive populations in Florida:

http://www.cnah.org/pdf_files/39.pdf
Krysko, K L, A N Hooper, and C M Sheehy. 2003. “The Madagascar Giant Day Gecko, Phelsuma Madagascariensis Grandis Gray 1870 (Sauria: Gekkonidae): a New Established Species in Florida.” Florida Scientist 66 (3): 222–225.

Note that there are several populations in Florida resulting from several introductions, and these are all attributed to the actions of exotic animal dealers, not herpetologists.

Florida is such a weird place! Cool that you can find Iguana (Americas), Phelsuma (Africa), and Hemidactylus (Asia) all at the same locality.

 

[smartalex1972]

Where exactly was the house where you found these? I just returned from Key West yesterday and would love to see some feral day geckos next time Im down there. I breed P. m. grandis.