Meet the Thick-tailed gecko
The thick-tailed gecko is a ground-dwelling gecko with a purplish to reddish-brown body dotted with small white spots and a fat, carrot-shaped tail. An original tail is black with crisp white bands, while a regrown one is a different shape and colour.
Its other name, barking gecko, comes from its defence display. When threatened it rears up, arches its back and gives a sharp bark, and the plump tail can be dropped as a decoy and regrown. The tail also stores fat.
It is nocturnal, hunting insects and other invertebrates at night and sheltering under rocks or in burrows by day. Unusually for a gecko, several individuals often share the same daytime shelter, and these groups may help them conserve warmth. Females lay two hard-shelled eggs.
Bory de Saint-Vincent described it in the 1820s as Phyllurus milii, honouring Baron Pierre Bernard Milius, a French naval officer and naturalist. The genus Underwoodisaurus honours British herpetologist Garth Underwood. The original specimen was lost, and a replacement (neotype) from Dorre Island in Shark Bay was designated in 2002.
Where it lives
Southern mainland Australia, from central Queensland through New South Wales, northern Victoria and South Australia to semi-arid Western Australia, as far as Shark Bay.