Common House Gecko: Pet or Pest?

Typical House Geckos are Brownish in Color

In most countries, the sight of seeing a house gecko (hemidactylus frenatus) or house lizard might seem offputting, but in reality, these little critters may be saving your life while you sleep.

Some Basic Info

A house gecko or house lizard is usually 2 to 6 inches depending on age. They are often brown and green depending on the climate of your country. They have no eyelids and some species are even see-through. They have a usual diet of bugs and insects. They do not eat or feed off of human food.

House Geckos in Home Hunting

The common house geckos can often be observed in broad daylight hanging around on the wall near where the lightbulbs are.

Despite being considered an “invasive species” they can actually play a great role in your home’s ecosystem.

• House Geckos love to eat cockroaches, ants, roaches, moths, small spiders, bed bugs, and many other insects.
• House Geckos may have chosen to reside in your home because of a plentiful amount of bugs to feed off. If there are no bugs left in your house, they will leave immediately.
• They can often eat large colonies of small insects at once.

Let The House Geckos Be

If you have a small insect infestation and currently have some house geckos, it is probably best to leave them be, since they are helping reduce the number of parasites inside your home.

With this said you may have to put up with a few things:

• Gecko droppings: Usually gray and brown with a white tip, geckos usually leave these small droppings on doorposts or wall corners. Albeit not that noticeable, it is just something to look out for especially if they fall on carpets, tables, or other sensitive furniture.
• Appearance: Some find them cute, but most people find them to be a tad creepy.

Besides all of these though, you should still consider keeping the geckos in your home because of the many benefits that they come with, especially when you have a pest problem.

References:

1. Keim, Lauren (2002). The spatial distribution of the introduced Asian House Gecko (Hemidactylus frenatus) across suburban/forest edges (BSc Honors thesis). Unpublished Honours Thesis, Department of Zoology and Entomology, the University of Queensland.
2. ^ Jump up to:a b c Marcellini, Dale (1971). “Activity Patterns of the Gecko Hemidactylus frenatus”. Copeia. American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists. 1971 (4): 631–635. doi:10.2307/1442631. ISSN 0045–8511. JSTOR 1442631.