Wood Slave Gecko

hi Jedi, You're really better off leaving them alone, since they eat bugs, which is a very good thing!!! Wood slaves mainly come out at night and they are very reclusive. They're afraid of you, too, and won't try to come near you, and they don't bite so there's really no reason to be afraid (other than you think they look icky). Just one of the charms of living down here!

I didn't like them either, until one of them came in the back door and walked straight across the room to the only centipede that had made it in our house, and then proceeded to kick the crap out of him in an epic duel.

I'm not kidding. They are welcome in my house now.

Yes, they eat mosquitoes especially!! Not a gecko though.

RL

Just name 'em. 🙂

letahal,
that's freakin hilarious. LMAO!!

So I have to live with the pale skinned, black bulging eyes critters.
GEEZ!!!
Is there no remedy known to at least keep them outside they really terrify me.
I have pulled my bed from against the wall for fear that they're behind the head board.
If not I guess some Cruzan before bed should do the trick.

ah, keeping them outside treats the symptom but not the cause of the terror. they really are harmless and rather clean. are you scared of them because you cannot control them?

perhaps that's a bit more of a buddhist inquiry then you were looking for though. 🙂

best of luck! i'd rather have pet geckos than take my chances with dangerous insects...

Cherish the lizards!! I rarely have them in my house because the cats will chase them and try to eat them. If I find one in my house, I scoop it up in my hands and put it outside, otherwise it will be cat food. But, I miss them!! And I have a ton of mosquitos!

letahl , yes that total went over my head..but thanks for your response.

And I am off to get a cat. I will take my chances with the mosquitoes.
Thanks everyone.

Try the humane society for your new kitty friend. as local kitties, they will have the most experience with island critters...

We have one....named him "Gecko, James Gecko"....and hearing all this discussion of them in this thread has me both giggling and VERY thankful. Doubt we'll get an 'epic battle' with a centipede, but James is out there doing his job on our back patio just fine...and we LOVE him for it!

If you don't like lizards, you should think about relocating where they don't have any.
They are a fact of life here in the islands, harmless and beneficial on cutting down the other really unwanted bugs you have in a house in a tropical climate.

I have 1 that lives in the screen on my kitchen window (same one there forever it seems), another that inhabits the screens and plants in the living room and 1 in my bedroom that is no bother to me. It's not like they are going to be leaping on you or hurt you.

I enjoy watching them hunt and gobble up the mosquitoes/flies that invade my space.

Just part of the charm of the islands, mon. Get used to it or start packing.
It's hard to believe someone would be terrified of a lizard when there are so many fierce and harmful insects they keep at bay.

Good Luck with the scorpions, centipedes, large ground and house spiders, roaches and ants, all of which lizards like to snack on in your home.Make them welcome!

I miss Trade!!!

I know where you can get an iguana. Do they eat geckos?

I was sitting on the gallery of Cruzan Cottage of CbtS reading the Daily news when the alfa male gecko (enole?) tried to sneak up on me. If he knew I was looking at him he would freeze. (if I don't move he can't see me.) Finally I really didn't look at him and he made a mad dash and bit my bare big toe. Then he shot back to the bushes to tell all his friends how he "showed" that human who was boss. It was the biggest laugh of the trip.

slave, gecko and enole are all different.

I love the wood slaves. Had a bunch in my shack in the bush and I miss them. They got pretty big.

All the lizards are cool, except for that new one over around golden rock, that gets a foot long and eats all the other lizards.

Gotta learn to love the critters! I think I spend my entire first year on island (STT) photo-documenting various creatures.

This little guy spent his entire life in the main room of the house and was always fun to watch. He got so acclimated to us that we could walk up and touch him and he wouldn't run lol.

Wood slaves are geckos. Hemidactylus mabouia. Nocturnal and have no eye lids. They lick their eyes to clean them.

Anoles are Diurnal - not geckos. Have eyelids

What I find TOTALLY fascinating is you all in STX have totally different species of anoles than we do. Ours look nothing like yours. Yours are Way prettier! Lol.

You have the STX anole Anolis acutus
We have (mostly) Crested anoles - Anolis cristatellus

We do have other geckos in the VI:
Broad tailed geckos
Two spot/ eye spot geckos
Both on STT and STX

STX has a rarer gecko too that we don't have: The Saint Croix Sphaero

GECKOS ARE THE BEST HOUSEGUESTS! Trust me you want them inside. They eat roaches, ants, mosquito, fruit flies, moths and spiders. They are the single best indoor critter you can ask for. I have quite a few inside and cleaning the poop is annoying but my house is practically bug free... Except lately with the mozzys - so bad ugh. Then again I'm a weird chick who puts orb weavers in my bathroom on purpose to catch the mosquitos. It works!

Yeah the geckos are the only things we left alone,although one of my Great Danes used to like to chase them up the wall. He ruined the couch jumping on it.

Millipedes we would pick up and put outside. Everything else got bug spray. We had our house sprayed every one or two months.

I'd like to say we were bug free, but the ants that get into food are the worst. So hard to deal with.

In this part of the world, Geckos are considered to bring luck. I love them. Any creature that eats roaches and centipedes is welcome. One of the Geckos in my house likes to clean up cookie crumbs he finds on the sofa. Mainlanders are forbidden to harm them in my house. Much better than lots of chemicals......

I have several in my place. I'm pretty much insect free. One of them saved me 15% on my car insurance!

I have wood slaves in my home but i also have a ton of mosquitoes still!
When rainy season comes along, there's still a ton of centipedes
I'd do anything in my power to exterminate woodslaves

Don’t really mind them but they crap everywhere, and it’s a pain cleaning up so I’ll chase them out with a broom when they sneak into my house.

If they really bother you, relocate them outside. Easy enough to do.
For unwanted critters that I can't pick up by hand, I use a mesh speghetti strainer and a file folder to slide under it.

Lizards and baby iguanas that get inside can easily be picked up by hand and moved to an outdoor location.

I don't mind lizards in the house tho.