The animals of Thailand are revered, rare, amazing and dangerous. Geckos - Domestic Lizards - Geckos in Thailand

In Thailand, it gets dark early and quickly. There is practically no dusk. At six o'clock in the evening the sun is still in the sky, then it rapidly sinks into the sea, enchanting beautiful sunsets, and at seven o'clock in the evening the tropical night already dominates. On the first day, as soon as it got dark, we heard loud screams right under the window of the room in which we lived in a hotel on Koh Chang. so yell lizards in thailand- males of one of their largest species Gecko gekko. gecko toki quite large, up to about 30 cm. An adult male can bite his finger up to a fracture of the phalanx - the grip of the jaws of a bulldog.

Geckos live alone, and with their screams they mark the territory and lure their mate - the gecko. Our house gecko yelled regularly every evening until late at night - apparently, family relationships had not yet developed for him. Objectively, it should be noted that the screams were not particularly annoying - the animal made a certain sequence of sounds once (albeit very loudly), fell silent, then after a certain time (after about 30 minutes, at least check the clock) repeated the ritual. The lizard has hooks on its legs - it moves freely along the walls and ceiling. Our neighbor lived, apparently, on the roof of the house, and in the evenings appeared above the terrace.

In southeast Asia, people believe that if a home gecko settles nearby, it means good. Hearing his cry is for well-being, good luck and happiness. Well, we in Thailand were endowed with this many times every night! All photos can be enlarged.

A lizards in thailand smaller size great multitude. Several small geckos lived in our room, and it was impossible to lure them out. They apparently fed on ants and midges. Insects in a room in this country are the norm (the main thing is not to forget to carefully remove crumbs and other food debris). Although we sometimes threw something edible into the trash for our geckos, and they rustled the bag in a funny way all night. This is how they looked (their exactly the same relatives at that time were running in dozens along the walls of the illuminated terraces, gathering under the lamps and catching various small animals for dinner):

And I found this gecko of a different species one morning on a tree. He has a long tail:

Thailand is very warm and humid, especially during the rainy season, so given country ideal for breeding many species of snakes, insects, and indeed any living creatures except for penguins and polar bears, which would probably not stand the heat. I happen to meet some representatives of these species on Koh Samui every day without even visiting. It’s enough just to go outside from the house, and sometimes you don’t need to go anywhere, but just raise your head to the ceiling at night in the kitchen.

geckos

Small lizards with suckers on their paws and large black eyes, they feed on mosquitoes and other insects, and partially save a person from annoying and arrogant mosquitoes. Geckos love to hang on the ceiling near the light bulb or on the terrace and wait for the midge, they also sometimes come to rummage in the trash can, rustling with bags, but the lizards are completely harmless to humans and try to escape along the ceiling or wall, sometimes they believe that it (the lizard) is not it will be noticeable if it becomes motionless.

snakes and birds

Green palm snake
The most common snake living in resorts is the palm snake, it usually lives in a tree, on a tall or not very tall palm tree, in bamboo thickets, or just on tough bushes. It feeds on lizards, including geckos, sometimes this process can even be observed if you are a little more attentive than usual, paying attention to tree trunks.

The snake itself is quite intelligent, for example when I noticed that it attacked a gecko and coiled itself around it, partly already feeding on it. The snake quickly finished its work, and stretched out along the red bamboo trunk, putting its head between the leaves and watching my further actions, i.e. this is a real disguise that helps her survive.

When we called the Thai, to remove her away from us, because. she was sitting practically near children's toys on the terrace, the Thai did not kill her, but only drove her away, arguing that she was not poisonous or slightly poisonous.

The next day, we picked up a large plastic doll from the ground and the snake lay right under it, quickly crawling away from us, i.e. there was no need to attack us.

The snake peeks out after noticing surveillance

The palm snake lives mainly on trees, it can climb there, but there is no way to crawl back, so it has worked out the jumping technique, rigidly stretching its body, it jumps from the tree, spreading its front part for flight, and successfully lands on its belly.

It looks intimidating when I'm driving down the road and a snake flies right down the road a few meters from me.

Black birds with yellow heads also report the appearance of a snake, with loud cries and fly in a whole flock around the snake, perhaps they can also drive it away or kill it, but their help is obvious.

bull frog

In the rainy season, when water pours from the sky like buckets of water for several days, and even going out for half a minute means being completely wet from head to toe. Under powerful streams of such tropical rain, bullfrogs moo very loudly, this is really a moo like that of an ordinary cow, loud and rude, not at all like croaking. Especially when they are in a group, it is very noisy. Some species even have teeth.

Ticks, spiders, mosquitoes and centipedes

Ticks are also found in the Moscow region, in the Crimea or Belarus, but they can only be found in grass thickets, here, they are mainly carried by dogs, for example a domestic dog, it can easily bring a dozen ticks directly to your house, on its fur, then you have to look for them and kill them with a sprayer with poison or crush them with something hard, because. crushing a tick is not so easy, it is very tough. You need to be careful with them, because. very small and inconspicuous, reddish in color, you can buy a special poison in any supermarket.

But spiders are really frightening sizes, with an apple, but they also go hunting for midges at night, so they have no contact with a person.

The same is with centipedes, their life does not come into contact with humans, and you should not be afraid of them, since they can be carriers of tropical diseases.

monitor lizards

A huge lizard the length of a dog can easily run around various garbage cans right in the center, where restaurants, people and traffic are.

Driving along the ring road, I heard the squeak of a woman, and saw that a fat and clumsy monitor lizard with a long tail was running right under my wheels, he was in a hurry so that he would not be crushed, the road is still full of cars and mopeds.

It is not dangerous for humans, because. will flee from you, you are in any case larger than him and possibly in emergency will defend itself with its tail and teeth, but in general such situations are very rare.

Monkey

You won’t see it in the wild, I know in Malaysia or some places in Thailand, it’s possible even to take a picture among a flock of monkeys right in the city, but on Koh Samui they are used for work, namely to pluck coconuts from palm trees.

Because it's hard for a human to reach coconuts, even using sticks or other devices, it's really very, very high, it's much easier to train a monkey to climb a palm tree and pluck fresh coconuts.

Therefore, monkeys drive around the island in cars, on the hood in front of the driver or on the roof of the car, usually they are tied to the car, but they make funny faces at people passing by, right in the direction of travel.

Dogs

Everywhere a dog is one of the main friends of a person, in Thailand this becomes more important, because. a dog in a complex of houses, also serves as a protector and guard, they move without chains and they do not have booths, but they do not attack a stranger for no reason.

And the dog has an important task, like the mongoose Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, who protected the family of people from an evil cobra. A dog, even the most nondescript or fat one, is capable of killing snakes, even one as dangerous and intelligent as a cobra.

I witnessed when a long brown snake appeared near the pool and it was only necessary to point out two dogs (not purebred, ordinary like mutts) at it, as they rushed at it and only pieces of the snake remained, it flew like a helicopter all over the district, and then she also added birds.

Respect animal world, not animals come to our house, it's us who came to their world of jungle and survival!

Often in Thailand in the evenings, you can hear sounds like “tuuu-kei, tu-kui” or like clicking your tongue, and it’s not even possible to understand where they come from. You won’t believe it, but big and small geckos yell like that in the evenings, in Thailand they are called “tokai” tokay and ginger. They are very common not only in Asia, but almost all over the globe.

IN Thailand Lizards are innumerable. The creatures are quite harmless and even beneficial, as they feed on mosquitoes, midges, ants and all such insect muck. They come in different sizes and colors. On the roof of the house Koh Samui lived a blue-gray fat belly in a circle, on Koh Tao brown and long-tailed, recently I saw a small one with neighbors, 17-20 cm, but with such huge spikes on the back, a stegosaurus and nothing more!

Such a Tokay lived on the wall of a house on Koh Samui

Separately, I also want to say about the numerous gingers (ginger) - small geckos that inhabit the walls and roofs of houses. They sleep during the day and are almost invisible, and in the evening they go hunting, especially in places where the lights are on and have dinner. They also feed on small midges and mosquitoes. It is very interesting to watch these nimble and graceful creatures. When the ginger catches a midge, and if it suddenly also turns out to be big, after eating it it will be fun to wag its tail. If you look closely, then geckos have four fingers with large claws on each foot.

They are found in Thailand and these are geckos

Gingers, although they seem cowardly at first glance, are very curious. They also strictly adopted the division of the territory, each lives in his own area, and if he enters someone else's territory, there will definitely be a battle, alas, the strongest will survive. Like their large gingers, they come in a variety of colors from almost transparent white to black, with spotted brown, gray-black and yellow-brown being more common.

Driving through the streets in the evenings, if you pay attention, the geckos come out for dinner on shop signs and illuminated billboards. They love to eat midges in the evenings. Alas, no one notices these handsome men anymore and they have become part of Everyday life Thais. For us, they have become very cute pets, for whom we leave a light on the terrace in the evenings.

Ginger plump lives on the wall of the house in Hua Hin

On the wall of my house Hua Hin a brown ginger lives, sleeps on the window frame, and in the evening crawls near the window and has dinner, a couple of babies huddle on the opposite wall of the house, but are rarely shown. It’s a pity, but I haven’t seen big blue tokais in our village yet, but some beautiful lizards with crests and a tail twice as long as their body run along the path.

We are often asked what to fear in Thailand. There are dangers in Thailand, and it's not just ladyboys. Therefore, we decided to tell you what kind of living creatures there are in Thailand, which you can not be afraid to eat, and which is better not to touch. Indeed, for an ordinary city dweller, especially from the middle lane, even a snake is a curiosity, and in Thailand such curiosities are at every turn.

From the article you will learn:

geckos

The first animals we met in Tae were geckos. They come in two varieties: small sonorous chinchoks and large tukke geckos.

Chinchoks are harmless creatures. From time to time they fall from the ceiling. The biggest harm that a chinchok can do to a home is poop. Therefore, it is good not to let Chinchoks into the house. On the veranda they are very useful: they hunt for all sorts of insects and mosquitoes.

Tukke or toki are geckos the size of half an arm. Tukka are nocturnal animals. Probably, every tourist at least once heard the gecko “tuk-keee” in the evening. Thais associate various signs, both good and bad, with tukka.

What are the benefits of tukkas? The fact that they do not get along with snakes. If a tukke lives in the house, then the snakes definitely will not settle.

Our Thai neighbor Wen was very afraid of the tukka. For some reason, it seemed to her that they grow into crocodiles, although she knew that this was not so. But I'm afraid I can't. Kicked out all the tukkes. And she had snakes on the roof. The green ones are like a whole cube.

We didn’t drive out our currents, and we didn’t have snakes. I wrote in detail about geckos in a post.

snakes in thailand

Since we are talking about snakes, let's talk about snakes 🙂

The first time we saw a snake on the islands of Phi Phi. They even took a picture of it:

Then they googled that it was a ringed flattail. A sea snake that can often be found near corals. She is poisonous, but not aggressive, and she will not rush at a person. They write that Indian fishermen with their bare hands take out the caught flattails from the nets in order to release them. The snake will only bite if you cause it a sharp pain.

But those green snakes that lived with a neighbor:

Google suggested that this is a harmless green snake.

And, of course, the answer to the question of whether snakes crawl into the house:

How long we lived in houses, such a little animal did not visit us. Huge spiders climbed out of the shell, bugs flew in through the window, but, fortunately, the snakes did not crawl. By the way, here's a tip: when it rains, close the holes in the sinks and showers, it is from there that all sorts of centipede spiders climb.

Mosquitoes in Thailand

Are mosquitoes dangerous in Thailand? Definitely yes. From the bite of a small Thai mosquito, you can get dengue fever, and that's it, we've arrived. The temperature is about 40, pain all over the body, it hurts bones, joints and I don’t want to live anymore. Yes, I was “lucky” to get sick.

There is no vaccination against dengue fever, and a sick person is urgently hospitalized. It is better not to joke with this, and not to self-medicate. and don't be afraid of any mosquitoes.

The very first time we came to Thailand at the end of the rainy season. I won't say that there were many mosquitoes. Maybe I didn't notice them. Still, the impressions went off scale: after all, we ended up on another planet. And on another planet, the rules are different. It is better to follow them from the very beginning than to experience everything for yourself.

How to protect yourself from mosquitoes in Thailand?

In Thailand, even the usual 7/11 sells sprays, creams and other mosquito repellents. The anti-mosquito shelf looks like this:

The little pink spray bottle protects very well and we use it regularly. In jars with a pink lid on the left - anti-mosquito lotion. In small bags on the right (5 baht each) - the same lotion, only in a smaller package.

Our Thai friend told us about a wonderful bush of green basil that grew in her pot. According to her, green basil repels mosquitoes. But for some reason, the basil scare away mosquitoes only from her, and they bit us - they slurped so much. Then it turned out that the secret of the basil pot was in the mosquito repellent cream that Wen smeared every evening 🙂

The current folk life hack against mosquitoes is to drink water with lemon or lime. Helps from time to time. I regularly drink lime water, it helps to concentrate. But mosquitoes also regularly eat me if they forget to apply a spray or lotion.

Often in restaurants near the river, Thais themselves light mosquito coils. There are especially many bloodsuckers near the water. In Kanchanaburi, it’s just impossible to dine without protection.

By the way, we noticed that there are times when mosquitoes are very active. Usually at sunset time (sunset in Thailand around 18-30), small vampires are activated by 200%. From 17-30 to 19-00 it is better not to stick your nose out into the street. There are swarms of hungry mosquitoes waiting for supper. And after sunset, there are no mosquitoes again.

In our arsenal there are a couple more tips on how to protect yourself from mosquitoes.

1. Get serious about your choice of accommodation. Look for accommodation with mosquito nets. We lived in a house with and without nets. In the first case, they didn’t know any problems, in the second case, they had to get a fumigator or sleep with the windows closed with air conditioning.
2. In our experience, it's best not to stay near a body of water, especially if the windows don't have mosquito nets. One of the apartments we rented in Bangkok overlooked the pool garden. A garden is pots of flowers and water. Mosquitoes flew in even during the day! It is not for nothing that fines have been introduced in Singapore for the fact that water remains in the pot / pan after watering the flowers.
3. Mosquitoes don't fly in high floor. Such an observation we made after in Bangkok.
4. In condominiums, the territory and apartments are regularly treated against insects and mosquitoes. In private homes, such processing is rare, unless the house is in the village.

Ants

It would seem that what is terrible in ants? Until you go to Asia, you will not understand 🙂

After living in Thailand, it turned out that ants are sooooo different. From crayons, barely noticeable, but probably the most annoying, to large ones that can eat you if you hesitate.

I accidentally stepped on ants on the veranda of the house a couple of times. It feels like stepping on a nail! And then the bite site hurts for another week, and the bump keeps.

How to protect yourself at sea? Do not swim in the rain or at night. Thais told how tourists were killed by stingrays, especially in the rain. Before swimming, ask if there are jellyfish. If there is - endure and swim in the pool. If a red jellyfish bites, paralysis may set in.

Also, don't swim in the corals at low tide. This is also dangerous. The water level drops, and you can accidentally hit a sea urchin.

Some fear and horror post turned out. In fact, I haven’t told everything about scorpions yet, it’s not so gloomy. Forewarned is forearmed.

P.S. Mom, if you suddenly read this post, then ... see, no sharks!

What Thai living creatures have we encountered yet?

Harmless crabs:

The goggle-eyed fish was seen only in a dead form:

Once a mouse came to us:

Small, with a tail twice as long as the mouse itself, she sat on the grate of the front door and was afraid. Somewhere nearby wandered the old red cat Meu.

In addition to geckos, there are also beautiful lizards in Thailand:

Lizards are very shy and completely safe. Near our house she lived alone, until she was dragged to dinner by a bird that fell like a stone from the sky.

In Bangkok, it is easy to meet monitor lizards in parks. If you do not make them angry, then they are cute and safe. And so - they can catch up and bite off their legs. Seriously. On Koh Tao monitor lizards regularly eat tourists.

This is where I will end the post. If you have any questions or additions, I will be happy to hear them in the comments 🙂

Hello! My name is Tatyana, and I am glad to see you on the blog “Life is unpredictable!”.
I love to travel, and I share my impressions, tips and other useful notes on my blog.

Every time you rent a house, condo or even just a guesthouse in Thailand, you get not only a place to sleep and a roof over your head, but also a number of little neighbors. Harmless and not so...

The rainforest is one big green organism. Man over the years, of course, has adapted to live next to this riot of nature, but for this he has to share housing and food with the most cunning and lazy tropical inhabitants.

It is worth turning on the light on the veranda in the evening, as clouds of midges immediately flock, and geckos and bats come to dine with insects.

From the nearest puddle, they jump into the garden for reconnaissance of a completely hallucinogenic species. frogs:

And beautiful, absolutely beautiful toads. Well, we actually bought this one at the bazaar, but they come even better.

And to the house through open door fly some unfed hummingbird the size of a beetle. Perfect place for the nest, I brush!

Well, some lazy cattle categorically refuse to live in the wild and finally cling to human habitation.

Almost every house in Thailand, and certainly the village, comes with some unfortunate, not very tropical mammal. As a rule, these are cats, but there are also quite stupid carefree ones. dogs, like these:

As I already wrote somewhere, almost all cats in Southeast Asia - mutants carriers of a stable mutation: their tails grow with the letter "G", tied in a knot or completely absent. But on Koh Phangan, a rare specimen lives under our house - a cat with a normal tail. Exceptionally talkative.

But you can’t surprise our man with cats and dogs, so let’s move on to the exotic.

The most numerous inhabitants of Thai houses are ants. Moreover, if in the "black earth" Hua Hin we did not have them at all, then in our Pangan house there are already several species of them.

On the veranda we have fighting red ants that walk all day long along the railing with their asses up and their jaws open. They guard the house and finish eating after the cat.

But what happens if you do not remove the remains of a delicious dinner from the veranda. Fear and horror. Then taking away their plate is a separate entertainment, as in a joke about a sofa and bedbugs. The ants are angry and do not give the plate =))

What’s more, there are so many goodies left!

Black forest ants come to the kitchen at night from the garden. Unlike redheads, they are not at all aggressive and are only interested in the contents of a garbage bag and dirty dishes.

If you turn on the light in the kitchen, they immediately tactfully scatter.

Well, there are also quite microscopic ants that live everywhere and can settle in a laptop and other equipment.

In Hua Hin, instead of ants, we were visited by giant tropical cockroaches. Periodically, they lay down with their paws up under the kitchen door, and I was terribly afraid to step on them with my bare foot.

Thai cockroaches have one big advantage over the Prussians who left the Moscow garbage chutes untimely: they come one by one. So all these horror stories about a loaf of sausage stolen by cockroaches from a dorm room, they don't work here.

In general, these cockroaches would not be so scary if not for one fact: they can fly. They do it lowly and rather clumsily, but this is quite enough to demoralize the enemy.

Of the other cute insects in Thailand, you can find these everywhere millipedes(not to be confused with scolopendra). They are 15 centimeters long, do not bite and are quite harmless.

Of the "hurtful" creatures on the islands, there are quite a few snake, and the people drive them straight from their own yards.

So far, we have seen the snake only in the forest and everywhere - crushed on the roads.

The list of reptiles is opened by all sorts of different lizards. We feed this pangolin with chicken. Eating and getting fat.

And this one was not fed anything and they were afraid that he himself would not bite off something. Several of these meters monitor lizards hung out at our site in Krabi.

Well, a Thai pet that leaves no one indifferent is, of course, gecko.

There are two main types of them here: small translucent tintoki, which watch for flies near the light bulbs and noisily fumble in the trash can. If you suddenly enter the room and turn on the light, they fall funny from the ceiling.

And the second type is healthy spotted tukei. In our country, they are known as "gecko currents" and many keep them in terrariums.

Geckos are nocturnal creatures, during the day they sleep in different cracks, and at night they crawl out closer to the light to dine with beetles.

The other day we had a small natural disaster - it rained for almost a day, it poured from the roof like a river, the bushes by the porch stood knee-deep in water.

And a whole Noah's ark gathered on the veranda: on the floor - a crowd of unfortunate ants, whose nest apparently flooded, and on the ceiling - a motley company of geckos, starving and freezing.

The most daring comrades immediately climbed into the house and quickly gathered some winged goats that had flown into the light.

On the paws of geckos, there are no suction cups, but microscopic hooks with which they cling to the slightest bumps. Because of this, they run very funny along the walls and ceiling, stamping their flat fingers on a grand scale. Here in the photo you can just see how the lizard tears off its hind leg.

With the help of such a device, even cattle weighing 500 grams calmly walks on tiles and glass.

Picture for scale:

Already after writing this post, an almost hand-made small tukey came to us and gave himself a proper anointing. Therefore, I will add photos:

Tookeys are beautiful not only appearance and the ability to walk on the ceiling, but also with their songs. I'm sure everyone who has been to Thailand has heard their croaking, but not everyone knows the source of these divine sounds heard in the night.

By the way, the tukey got its name precisely because of them: if you listen, geckos really say “tu-kei”, “tu-kei”. Thus, males protect their hunting grounds from the encroachments of rivals.

This is how it sounds like:

And so it looks.