Hello Beverly,
Wednesday, December 20, 2000, 1:47:42 PM, you wrote:
BE> Is there any info on the relationship of Agamura (spider geckos) to
BE> Stenodactylus?
Wow! What a great question. I wish there was a great answer. Right now
the phylogenetic relationships among Afro-Asian geckos is a hot topic
and folks are slowly inching towards some real answers. The most
current and well recognized work is probably Szczerbak and Golubev's
"Gecko Fauna of the USSR and Contiguous Regions." They suggest that
Agamura is most closely related to Tenuidactylus with Stenodactylus as
a related side group. Here is a copy of the cladogram they came up
with based on (mainly) physical characteristics.
Agamura Tenuidactylus
\ |
\ | Carinatogecko
\ | /
\ | /Bunopus
\| / / Stenodactylus
|/ / / Crossobamon
Cyrtodactylus | / /___/
\ | /___/
\ |/
\ |
\ |
\|
\
\
Stenodactylus and Pristurus are both, according to Szczerbak and
Golubev and Arnold Kluge,
members of the tribe Gekkonini based on the absence of the second
ceratobranchial hyoid arch (part of a bone in the throat).
Stenodactylus is, though, quite unique among geckos based on the
number of scleral ossicles (small ossified plates embedded in the
scleroid coat of the eye). Most Gekkonids have 13-15 per eye while
Stenodactylus have an average of 20-28 per eye! Agamura has 14/eye and
Crossobamon has 14-15/eye. This high number of scleral ossicles led
Kluge(back in 1967) to separate Stenodactylus (along with
Teratoscincus) into a separate group that he termed type II
Gekkoninae. (As a side note, if 13-16 ossicles/eye is the ancestral
state and the high number that Stenodactylus possess is a derived
state [as Kluge suggests] then the Stenodactylus/Crossobamon clade is
a polyphyletic group [Oh no!]) You can see how this starts to get
confusing. The bottom line is that A LOT more work needs to get done
in this area and, I guess, to finally answer your question, it does
not seem that Agamura and Stenodactylus are very closely related.
--
Best regards,
Tony mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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