In The Vast Namib Sand Sea, A Chorus Of Thousands Of 'Dropping Marbles' Led Scientists To A New Species Of Gecko

In The Vast Namib Sand Sea, A Chorus Of Thousands Of 'Dropping Marbles' Led Scientists To A New Species Of Gecko

In The Vast Namib Sand Sea, A Chorus Of Thousands Of 'Dropping Marbles' Led Scientists To A New Species Of Gecko Along the African coast lies the world’s only coastal desert: the Namib Sand Sea. The ecological marvel, which spans 7,605,162 acres, encompasses shifting, mountainous dunes bathed in low-hanging fog.  And every evening, a chorus of distinct, plopping sounds ring out from burrows across the landscape.  Recently, the calls led a team of scientists to a new gecko species: the P. sceletus .  “The call strongly resembles the sound of bouncing marbles and, on a warm evening on the interdunes, thousands can be heard calling in chorus,” lead author François S. Becker observed in the study, which was published in Vertebrate Zoology on August 28.  According to researchers, the P. sceletus , or Skeleton Coast barking gecko, is named both due to its location — the Skeleton Coast between the Swakop River and the Kunene River — and its haunting appearance.  The Skeleton Coast barking ge…