What should we name our housemate?

Here in Kolonia we have quite a few critters living in our house. These range from large Mammals, such as Megan and Oliver, to small insects, such as ants, mosquitoes and ticks. Somewhere in between mammals and mosquitoes is reptiles and our pet lizard. At first we noticed a few lizards in our house. We never minded their presence. Their diet and our hate of biting bugs and swarming ants created a kind of symbiotic relationship. In wasn't until we had been here a few months that I noticed the same lizard over and over again. Our lizard is a gecko, or more specifically, a mourning gecko. He (or she) is a pale, fleshy color most of the time but does have the ability to change colors depending on what surface he is on. The reason I know it is a single gecko as opposed to a family of geckos is that our gecko seems to have gotten into some kind of disagreement with another gecko, or maybe a bird, and consequently lost his tail. After some time his tail started to grow back so it was fairly easy to identify him as the length of his new tail was always unique. One interesting thing is that the color we see him as is not his "natural" color. When his tail was growing back it was his natural scaley color much like the color of the lizard here. So for quite awhile (maybe two or three weeks) he walked around our house with a tail that did not match his body, this made him very unique.

He is very special because he seems to hang around the places we desperately need a lizard, especially one who eats ants. Most of the times we see him either on our counter tops near the sink or near Oliver’s food dish. Both places that attract ants and both places that we have had a major problem with ants in the past. Even anteaters can’t match his wits when it comes to catching ants. To navigate ants follow each others trail, they probably leave some kind of chemical to do this, so when our little buddy finds one ant he usually finds quite a few. It is nice to have someone of his occupation around our house.

Our new friend is the best kind of pet. He feeds himself. He entertains himself. He doesn’t need to be let outside, of course we will not be able to house train him but his exhaust is minimal. As he is now a part of our household he needs a name. Oliver got his name because when he looked at me when we first met his eyes were asking, very sheepishly and respectfully, “Please sir, can I have some more?”. But I am unable to think of a clever name for our ant eating, tail growing friend. Please comment on this post with a suggestion for a name and Megan and I will choose the one we like best in a week or so. I know I have some nieces and nephews who would claim that naming animals is their specialty so please give them a chance to speak up.

Here is a pic of our unnamed friend on our dining room table…

Here he is with his new tail...