Apuntes sobre los gecos relacionados a Gonatodes concinnatus (O'Shaughnessy, 1881) en Colombia

For several decades, the O’Shaughnessy’s gecko Gonatodes concinnatus (O’Shaughnessy 1881), was considered a species with a wide geographic distribution throughout the lower and middle elevations of the eastern slopes of the Andean Cordillera, from Ecuador to Venezuela. However, subsequent studies revealed that it is a group of cryptic species. The goal of this work was to evaluate the geographic distribution of the species belonging to the Gonatodes concinnatus complex in Colombia. At least three species of this group occur in Colombia. Gonatodes riveroi Sturaro & Avila-Pires, 2011 in most part of the Eastern slopes of the Cordillera Oriental, Gonatodes concinnatus from the Department of Putumayo and Gonatodes ligiae Donoso-Barros, 1967 from the Department of Arauca. With these new records, the diversity of the genus Gonatodes increases to seven species in the country. We detected individuals with intermediate color patterns between Gonatodes riveroi and G. concinnatus, which could represent hybrid specimens. Finally, due to the difficulty in the identification of this species group, as well as the scarcity of exhaustive studies on the boundaries of their distributions, we recommend to carry out morphological and molecular studies, mainly in zones with apparently overlapping geographic distributions. We comment on the presence of G. hasemani Griffin 1917 in Colombia