Mourning Gecko for Sale: What to Look For Before You Buy
| Typical price | $15–40 per gecko |
| Common purchase size | Starter colony of 3–5 |
Signs of a healthy gecko
Look for a full, rounded body and tail (or a cleanly healed stub if already dropped), clear bright eyes, alert response and movement when approached, smooth even skin with no widespread stuck shed, and confident grip when climbing.
Pet store vs breeder
Mourning geckos are inexpensive and widely captive-bred, so both pet stores and reptile-specialist breeders commonly carry healthy stock — a breeder is more likely to know the clonal lineage and rearing history of a specific animal.
Realistic price ranges
Because they're small, easy to breed in captivity, and produce eggs continuously, mourning geckos are one of the least expensive popular pet geckos — typically $15–40 each, often cheaper when buying several at once to start a colony.
Buying a starter colony
Since same-sex aggression is largely absent between clonal individuals, many keepers buy 3–5 geckos at once to start a colony rather than a single animal — just make sure all individuals are close in size before housing them together.
After you buy
Plan for a basic quarantine period before introducing new geckos to an existing collection, and keep an eye on feeding and activity in the first couple of weeks even though this species settles in quickly.
See the full care guides guide, or browse all 299 info pages.
A single adult mourning gecko needs a minimum 12"x12"x18" front-opening, well-ventilated enclosure — taller matters more than wider since this species is highly arboreal — furnished with cork bark, branches, and dense foliage for climbing.
A complete mourning gecko setup needs a tall 18"+ front-opening enclosure, cork bark and branches for climbing, coco fibre/moss substrate, a misting routine to hold 60–80% humidity, and complete MRP powder — no heat lamp is required in most homes.
Hatchlings can start in a small (roughly 5"x5"x8") enclosure to make food easier to find, juveniles move up around a few months old, and adults need a minimum 12"x12"x18" vertical enclosure.
Mourning geckos generally do best at normal room temperature, roughly 75–82°F, and can suffer heat stress above about 82°F. Most homes need no basking bulb or heat mat at all — just monitoring during hot weather.
Low-level UVB (roughly 5–6% output) is increasingly recommended as good practice, though it isn't strictly mandatory for mourning geckos the way it is for a strongly basking desert species — their diet's built-in D3 from MRP covers much of the gap.
Mourning geckos need roughly 60–80% humidity, achieved through misting once or twice daily, with good ventilation to prevent the dampness from turning stagnant.