House Geckos

Here in Cambodia, Kevin and I have no pets. However, that doesn’t mean that our home is without creature companions.

What am I talking about? The house gecko, of course.

We have 1 living under our living room couch, and another living in the a/c unit in our bedroom. Fortunately, they’re fairly quiet, though the one in our room does like to chirp from time to time.

This is what it sounds like:

Sometimes these geckos can chirp quite loudly. When Kevin was living in Bangkok, I could hear them through the phone. Not realizing what we were hearing, he was convinced that there was some kind of exotic bird outside his window. Eventually, someone set us straight. Geckos make an impressive amount of noise for such a small creature!

We don’t mind having them around the house – they eat bugs, and they don’t make any mess. Sometimes they’ll startle us – I often see the couch dweller darting around the floor out of the corner of my eye. They’re green, cute, and have a jumpy little way of moving. They’re also completely harmless, and they’re not big enough to be intimidating (only around 2 inches long). Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about them:

The common house gecko, scientific name Hemidactylus frenatus (not to be confused with the Mediterranean species Hemidactylus turcicus known asMediterranean house gecko), is a native of Southeast Asia. It is also known as the Pacific house gecko, the Asian house gecko, or simply, the house lizard. Most geckos are nocturnal, hiding during the day and foraging for insects at night. They can be seen climbing walls of houses and other buildings in search of insects attracted to porch lights, hence their name “house gecko”. Spread around the world by ships, these geckos are now common in the Deep Southof the United States, large parts of tropical and sub-tropical Australia, and many other countries in South and Central America, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. They grow to a length of between 3-6 inches (975-150 mm), and live for about 5 years. These small geckos are non-venomous and harmless to humans. Medium to large geckos may bite if distressed, however their bite is gentle and will not pierce skin.

We’re pretty sure that Jean Luc would try to eat them, so it’s best that our cat is back in Canada. For now, we’ll just have to settle with being crazy gecko lovers. They move to quick for us to get photos of them, but believe me when I say they’re adorable.