The taxonomy of these "fish-scaled geckos" is particularly tricky. Until recently, most researchers relied on scalation and color/pattern to distinguish species. But these geckos easily lose and then regrow their scales, potentially altering both the scalation and the color/pattern. More recent DNA studies are starting to get a handle on the situation, but there are still many populations of Geckolepis that don't yet have a formally described species to belong to. There are possibly two types near Toliara, Geckolepis polylepis and a group assigned the label "OTU J" that is considered to be most closely related to Geckolepis typica, but probably not actually part of that species. These two types can be distinguished from each other by the number of scales around the body. G. polylepis has more, smaller scales whereas G. "typica" has fewer, bigger scales. I can't make out the individual scale edges on the photo of this young gecko. Perhaps it is regrowing previously lost scales? In any case, without being able to see the scales clearly, I can't even guess between G. polylepis and G. "typica" OTU J.

Here is a list of all the reptiles and frogs I saw on this 2023 trip to Madagascar.

All that stuff I said above? Same thing here.