''Aristelliger'' is a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

gecko Geckos are small, mostly carnivorous lizards that have a wide distribution, found on every continent except Antarctica. Belonging to the infraorder Gekkota, geckos are found in warm climates. They range from . Geckos are unique among lizards ...

s in the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Sphaerodactylidae The Sphaerodactylidae are a Family (biology), family of geckos (Gekkota) distributed in North America, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean, as well as in Southern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and into Central Asia. The fam ...

, commonly known as croaking geckos or Caribbean geckos. The nine named

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

in the genus are native to various islands in the

West Indies The West Indies is an island subregion of the Americas, surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, which comprises 13 independent island country, island countries and 19 dependent territory, dependencies in thr ...

, though the species '' A. georgeensis'' is also found on mainland

Belize Belize is a country on the north-eastern coast of Central America. It is bordered by Mexico to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and Guatemala to the west and south. It also shares a maritime boundary with Honduras to the southeast. P ...

. ''Aristelliger'' species are

nocturnal Nocturnality is a ethology, behavior in some non-human animals characterized by being active during the night and sleeping during the day. The common adjective is "nocturnal", versus diurnality, diurnal meaning the opposite. Nocturnal creatur ...

and mostly

arboreal Arboreal locomotion is the locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some animals may scale trees only occasionally (scansorial), but others are exclusively arboreal. The hab ...

, occupying

palm tree The Arecaceae () is a family of perennial, flowering plants in the monocot order Arecales. Their growth form can be climbers, shrubs, tree-like and stemless plants, all commonly known as palms. Those having a tree-like form are colloquially c ...

trunks and other vertical surfaces. They are among the largest

neotropical The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperate zone. Definition In biogeogra ...

geckos, with '' A. lar'' reaching up to 135 mm (5.3 inches) in snout-vent-length (not including the tail). They are primarily

insectivorous A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant which eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores we ...

, feeding on a variety of

arthropods Arthropods ( ) are invertebrates in the phylum Arthropoda. They possess an arthropod exoskeleton, exoskeleton with a cuticle made of chitin, often Mineralization (biology), mineralised with calcium carbonate, a body with differentiated (Metam ...

Cannibalism Cannibalism is the act of consuming another individual of the same species as food. Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded in more than 1,500 species. Human cannibalism is also well document ...

of eggs and hatchlings has been reported in '' A. cochranae''. ''A. lar'' is

omnivorous An omnivore () is an animal that regularly consumes significant quantities of both plant and animal matter. Obtaining energy and nutrients from plant and animal matter, omnivores digest carbohydrates, protein, fat, and fiber, and metabolize ...

, and may be an important

seed disperser In spermatophyte plants, seed dispersal is the movement, spread or transport of seeds away from the parent plant. Plants have limited mobility and rely upon a variety of dispersal vectors to transport their seeds, including both abiotic vectors, ...

for fruits of the plant ''

Marcgravia ''Marcgravia'' is a genus of plants in the Marcgraviaceae family commonly eaten by the dwarf little fruit bat. The genus is native to the Caribbean Islands, Central America, and South America, and genus is named in memory of the German naturalist ...

''. Many species of ''Aristelliger'' are accustomed to living among human structures, though several are threatened by urban and agricultural development or invasive species.

Species

Nota bene ( ; plural: ) is the Latin language, Latin phrase meaning ''note well''. In manuscripts, ''nota bene'' is abbreviated in upper-case as NB and N.B., and in lower-case as n.b. and nb; the editorial usages of ''nota bene'' and ''notate bene'' fi ...

'': A

binomial authority In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, altho ...

in parentheses indicates that the species was originally described in a genus other than ''Aristelliger''.

Species

References

Further reading