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Because fitness of ectotherms, including reptiles, is highly dependent on temperature and water availability, the study of ecophysiological traits, such as preferred temperature (T _p) and water loss rates (WLRs), may provide mechanistic evidence on the restricting factors to the species ranges. The Moorish gecko, Tarentola mauritanica, is a species complex with a circum-Mediterranean distribution. In the Iberian Peninsula, two sister parapatric forms of the complex, known as the Iberian and the European clades, are found. Ecological models previously performed using presence records and bioclimatic variables suggest niche divergence between both lineages correlated with precipitation rather than with temperature. In this study, we test this correlative hypothesis using ecophysiological evidence. In the laboratory, we analyzed the T _p and WLRs for 84 adult males from seven distinct populations ascribed to one of …