#lizars

The newfound reptile is notable for the extraordinary size and thickness of its scales—its Latin name means "very large scales." Almost like bony plates, the scales shear bloodlessly off G. megalepis along a special layer of cells at the base oft the skin called the "tear zone." The scales regenerate quickly, in mere weeks.

It's also unusual among its relatives in that it seems to shed skin with extraordinary ease.

“I personally have only ever once managed to catch one of these geckos without losing more than a few scales,” says study author Mark Scherz, a Ph.D. student at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.

“I was elated! You can look at any museum with these geckos and you see how seldom the [skin] stays intact. It’s almost ridiculous.”

Mistaken Identity

Indeed, in the late 19th century, scientists who first discovered this group of odd geckos in Madagascar had the same problem, describing how hard it was to catch tear-away geckos without losing a lot of scales. (In more recent times, researchers try to avoid direct contact altogether by luring them into bags.)

When the gecko loses its skin, it probably sees a humid shelter, Scherz adds. "I would imagine the geckos stay in such a shelter until the regeneration process is at least started, but I've never come across a gecko in the wild that still had exposed flesh from a previous encounter."

The numbers and patterns of scales are a central feature herpetologists use to identify and distinguish species from one another—part of the reason why it took so long to identify G. megalepis as a new species. Not only does the gecko look a lot like its relatives, it's also secretive and well camouflaged. For instance, researchers collected the first specimens of G. megalepis in 2004 in the craggy karst limestone terrain of Ankarana National Park, but the individuals were mistakenly lumped together with a similar looking species, G. maculata.

When genetic work in 2013 suggested as many as 12 distinct species of Geckolepis exist or once existed, Scherz decided to take a new approach to analyzing the geckos that didn't rely on outward appearance—observing their skeletal structures in sharp detail. 

Source: nationalgeographic.com