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Squamata · ScincidaeEntry 12 of 21,572
Juniper Skink, Ablepharus kitaibelii

Reptilia · Squamata

Ablepharus kitaibeliiCocteau, 1833

Juniper Skink

Photograph by AnimalObserverDeniz321, CC BY, via iNaturalist

A ground-dwelling, day-active, meat-eating skink from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 63 mm snout to vent.

Also called Snake-eyed skink.

Reptilia › Squamata › Scincidae › Ablepharus

Grows to
62.6mm
greatest recorded
Eats
Carnivorous
Active
Diurnal
Lives up to
4years
Body length across Scincidae

Longer than only 37% of all skinks anyone has measured.

37% of 1,710 species are smaller63% larger
24 mmthe whole family, smallest to largest500 mm

The bar is the rank itself: its length is the share of the family this animal exceeds. The chart below is the family’s real spread, on a logarithmic scale because body length here runs from 24 to 500 mm. The solid rule is this animal. Every bar is a count of real species, and nothing on this figure is estimated.

What is known

42 sourced facts, each taken from a named scientific dataset. How to read these.

Cited from a dataset unless a row is marked otherwise.

Standing in the world

Still living
Extant
Conservation status
Least Concern
Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
2008
Population trend
Stable

The animal itself

Limbs
Four legs
Venomous
No
Fangs
None
Longest recorded life
4years

3.5 years (Foufopoulos and Ives 1999), 4 (Vergilov et al. 2018)

Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
27°C81 °F

mean body temperature of active individuals in nature

Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
27°C

body temperature of active animals in nature

Size

Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
62.6mm2.5 in

Shai Meiri, unpublished

Length snout to vent · adult female mean
45mm1.75 in
Largest female · snout to vent
43.4mm1.75 in

snout-vent length; the source column mixes this with straight carapace length

Hatchling length · snout to vent
19.64mm0.8 in
Largest juvenile · snout to vent
20mm0.8 in
Body mass · greatestcomputed
4.89g0.17 oz

computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed

Body mass at hatchingmeasured
0.15g0.01 oz

How it lives

Diet
Carnivorous

Invertebrates (spiders and earthworms, Street 1979, Rogner 1997b), small invertebrates (Stille and Stille 2017)

How it hunts
Active foraging

Active (Cavalcanti et al. 2023)

Active
Diurnal

(e.g., pers. obs., Speybroeck et al. 2016, Stille and Stille 2017)/ crepuscular (Valakos et al. 2008)

Where it lives
Terrestrial

Leaf Litter (e.g., pers. pbs. And Vergilov and Natchev 2017), terrestrial (Foster et al. 2018)

Habitat
Forest, Grassland, Shrubland
Biome
Temperate Broadleaf & Mixed Forests
Active season · months of the year
10–12months
Region
Saharo-Sindian
Mainland or island
Mainland
Highest it lives · above sea level
2000m

max 1800 (Speybroeck et al. 2016), 0-1800 (Vergilov et al. 2016), max 1367 (Malakova et al. 2018)

Range size
713,060km²
Density
97–1100per hectare

Breeding

Reproduction
Oviparous
Average clutch
2.8eggs
Eggs or young per clutch
2–6eggs

2-4 (Stojanov et al. 2011, Speybroeck et al. 2016, Kwet 2015), up to 4 (Stille and Stille 2017), max 5 (Vergilov et al. 2018), 2-4, mean 2.78 (Glavas et al. 2018), 2-5 (Vergilov and Natchev 2018), Vergilov et al. 2018 (2-5, 35 eggs in 9 clutches: 3.9 on average)

Mean clutch
2.8–3.89eggs
Clutches a year
1per year
First breeds at
6months

Naming and history

Suborder
Sauria
Infraorder
Scincoidea
Subspecies
Ablepharus kitaibelii kitaibelii (BIBRON & BORY 1833) Ablepharus kitaibelii fabichi STEPANEK 1937 Ablepharus kitaibelii fitzingeri MERTENS 1952 Ablepharus kitaibelii stepaneki FUHN 1970
Described by
Cocteau
Moved to another genus · since it was first described
No
Described in
1833
Type locality
Greece

Keeping one

9.75 in × 9.75 in × 6.25 in(25 × 25 × 16 cm)

Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.

The standard sizes ground-dwelling species at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times snout-vent length.

Mindestanforderungen an die Haltung von Reptilien (Sachverständigengutachten), German Federal Ministry for Nutrition, Agriculture and Forestry, Animal Welfare Division, 10 January 1997. The standard states these floor areas are recommendations rather than binding limits.

From this animal’s own snout-vent length of 2.5 in (62.6 mm), at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.

Active animals measured in the wild averaged 81 °F (27 °C).

Mean body temperature of active individuals measured in nature. A measurement of the animal, not a setting for a thermostat.

Feeding

A prey item should be no wider than the space between the animal's eyes.

Widely used across reptile husbandry references. The stated reason is that the gap approximates the width of the throat, so wider prey is associated with impaction. This is established practice, not a measurement.

1kJ per day

Worked out for an animal of 5 g, the heaviest recorded for Juniper Skink — so it is the top of the range, not a figure for a particular animal. Weigh yours and the number will be lower.

An upper estimate, not a feeding target, and not veterinary advice. The equation covers only what an animal burns staying alive, so a growing, gravid or recovering animal needs more — and it was measured on wild animals, which move far more than one in an enclosure. Body condition and a vet who knows the species are what a feeding decision should rest on. Where this comes from.

What nobody knows

These are not gaps in our research. No scientific dataset records them for this species — and saying so is information you cannot get from a reference that simply leaves a field out.

  • — Length snout to vent · adult male mean
  • — Length snout to vent · adult mean
  • — Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
  • — Female length · mean, nose to tail
  • — Length nose to tail · adult male mean
  • — Length nose to tail · adult mean
  • — Largest male · snout to vent
  • — Largest female · shell length
  • — Largest male · shell length
  • — Hatchling length · nose to tail
  • — Largest juvenile · shell length
  • — Egg length
  • — Egg width
  • — Body mass · a typical adult
  • — Body mass · adult female, mean
  • — Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradient
  • — Eats arthropods
  • — Eats vertebrates
  • — Eats plant matter
  • — How the young develop
  • — Gestation or incubation
  • — Clutches in a year
  • — Hatchling length · smallest recorded
  • — Hatchling length · largest recorded
  • — Age at first breeding · female
  • — Mature from · youngest recorded
  • — Mature by · oldest recorded
  • — Size at maturity · smallest recorded
  • — Size at maturity · largest recorded
  • — Colour on the back
  • — Pattern on the back
  • — Pupil
  • — Sex decided by
  • — Red List criteria
  • — Home range · largest recorded
  • — Active in
  • — Lowest it lives · above sea level

Others in Scincidae

Take this data

Everything on this page is available as data under CC BY 4.0 — use it freely, credit it, no permission needed.

This species as JSON · the whole dataset

Cite this page

The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia (2026). Ablepharus kitaibelii. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/ablepharus-kitaibelii

@misc{ablepharus_kitaibelii_2026,
  title  = {Ablepharus kitaibelii},
  author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/ablepharus-kitaibelii}
}

Sources

  1. Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
  2. Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.
  3. Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.