The big, bright, green-coloured Andaman day gecko is a sight to behold; only that, you have to go all the way to the Andaman Islands to get a glimpse of it. Endemic to the islands, these geckos live in trees and are active during the day. Thanks to cash crops grown on these islands today, they can be found in plenty, feeding on bananas, coconuts and betel nuts. They belong to the genus called Phelsuma, believed to have evolved from Madagascar, an island about 6000 km away from the Andamans! A new study has traced their evolutionary history and has thrown some light on how they differ from the other geckos in the Andamans.
New research reveals that a unique Indian skink species arrived on the subcontinent by rafting across the ocean from Southeast Asia millions of years ago, a journey made possible by fluctuating sea levels.