New Thai Gecko and Skink
Posted by: Loren Coleman on September 12th, 2007
New species of gecko and skink were discovered in the forest of Chiang Dao mountain in Thailand’s northern province of Chiang Mai amid fears that forest fires might cause their extinction, a wildlife official said Wednesday.
Piyawan Niyomwan, a researcher of the National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation Department (DNP), said the new species were coincidentally caught in a trap, erected for the study of wild animals’ biological diversity.
Four brown skinks of the Tropidophorus sp. family, with scales on their heads, were longer than those of normal ones. Each of their bodies was five-cm long and the tails six-cm long.
“A new species of wild gecko, scientifically called Cyrtodacylus sp., with its alternated brown and yellow scaling body, was preliminarily confirmed as the world’s new gecko species,” said Piyawan.
She expressed concern that the newly-discovered animals would be at risk of extinction due to regular wildfire in the northern forest, adding that animal specialists would conduct further studies on the ecology, biology and behaviour of wild animals as there was not much information about the two new species so far.
The new species of gecko and skink were discovered during the DNP’s study project on Chiang Dao mountain since 2004. Among 321 other types of animals found on the mountain, 55 were mammals, 185 birds, 45 reptiles and 36 amphibians. (TNA)
Source: “New species of gecko, skink found,” Bangkok Post, Thailand.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
How does one go about claiming a new species I wonder?
Because I have seen many reptiles ( lizards ) that I have never seen before.
I guess a person would have to catch one and take it to the right people.
But who are the right people for something like that?
Would like say a University Biology lab or something like that be able to point a guy in the right direction.
By the way, these new discoveries are awesome.
Just goes to show how much we are finding every other day.
Can’t wait until the BIG ONES are proven to exist.
As long as they are not harmed in doing so.
I do have to ask what I think is a legitimate question. Why is it that only the small to microscopic cryptids are captured and cataloged and the large to giant size ones are not? There are many more species that are yet to be cataloged for western science. As far as being “discovered” the locals usually already know what these things are.
Alligator’s question is based on a false premise. Large animals are discovered and classified, for that is how we know about them in “Western Science.” Start with the okapi and mountain gorilla and work your way through the megamouth shark and saola and more recent examples.
Needless to say the “locals” knew about them. That goes without saying in cryptozoology, as we base some primary findings on ethnoknown evidence. From there, however, is what you do next to establish the reality of that information within the context of formal zoology that counts.
Just because the natives of northern California (Indians, EuroAmericans, AfricanAmericans, AsianAmericans, and others) know about Bigfoot does not mean Sasquatch have been officially “discovered” yet, of course.