54- 1. GEKKONID& 



Habits. Very little is known regarding the habits of 

 this gecko. Mr. Slevin found one under a loose flake of 

 granite on the side of a boulder. 



Mr. Stephens gives the following account of the capture 

 of his specimen: 



"I captured a specimen of Phyllodactylus tuberculosus in 

 western Imperial County under the following circumstances: 

 Nov. 26, 1920, Mr. Charles Sternberg and I were collecting 

 fossils on what is known locally as Coyote Mountain. On 

 most maps it is called Carrizo Mountain. It is a dozen miles 

 north of the Lower California boundary. Late in the after- 

 noon we started for camp, following down a rather steep 

 canon on the eastern slope. The day had been warm and 

 although the sun had been behind the high peak to the west an 

 hour or more the rocks were still warm. About half way down 

 the canon, at about 1500 feet altitude, I passed a big marble 

 boulder that had long before rolled down from the steep 

 hillside. A lizard ran across the perpendicular polished side 

 of the boulder, stopping at the edge of a crevice. At the 

 moment I thought it was a fence lizard and made to grab 

 for it. All I got was its tail as it darted into the crevice. The 

 crevice was shallow and taking the hammer and chisel I had 

 been using in cutting shells out of the limestone, I soon cut 

 away enough of the shallow crevice to uncover the lizard 

 and took it out. On getting it free I saw that the toes had 

 pads at the tips, the pads appearing white or translucent in 

 the rather dim light. It struck me then that no fence lizard 

 could have run across the nearly perpendicular polished face 

 of the boulder, and that I had a gecko. I had carelessly 

 dropped the tail and was unable to find it in the brief time I 

 could spare to hunt for it in the coarse gravel at the base of 

 the boulder." 



