Reptilia · Squamata
Anolis capitoPeters, 1863
Bighead Anole
Photograph by Ken-ichi Ueda, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A day-active, meat-eating lizard from the Neotropic region, reaching 102 mm snout to vent.
Once published as Norops capito — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Anolidae › Anolis
- Grows to
- 102mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
Longer than 88% of all species in Anolidae anyone has measured.
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 33.5 to 191 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
39 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
- 2012
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 28.85°C84 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 28.8–28.9°C84–84 °F
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 102mm4 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 85mm3.25 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 85mm3.25 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 27mm1 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 27mm1 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 21.64g0.76 oz
Shai Meiri, unpublished
snout-vent length; the source column mixes this with straight carapace length
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
- Active season · months of the year
- 12months
- Region
- Neotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 1800m
- Range size
- 278,978km²
- Density
- 7–33.3per hectare
insects and small lizards (Anolis polylepis, Andrews 1983) and other arthropods, slugs and frogs (Mora et al. 2012, McCranie and Kohler 2015), "spiders, ants, flies, katydids, caterpillars, and slugs" and smaller anoles (Henderson 2010), arthropods, lizards, frogs and slugs (Heimes 2022), worm (Herrera-Martinez et al. 2022)
e.g., Mesquita et al. 2016, Leenders 2019
(e.g., Pianka et al. 2017), prefers shade (Henderson 2010)
Arboreal and Leaf Litter / arboreal (Mesquita et al. 2016, Henderson 2010)/terrestrial ("Anolis capito is a large terrestrial anole" Perez-Martinez et al. 2021), arboreal but jumps to the ground to grab prey (Heimes 2022)
near sea level to 1800 ( Leenders 2019), low to 1000 (Heimes 2022)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 1eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 1eggs
- Mean clutch
- 1eggs
- Clutches a year
- 4per year
mean 1 (e.g., Mesquita et al. 2016)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Pleurodonta
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Peters
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1863
- Type locality
- Costa Rica
Keeping one
16 in × 16 in × 16 in(41 × 41 × 41 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.
The standard sizes ground species at 4 × 4 × 2.5 and climbing species at 4 × 2.5 × 4 times snout-vent length.
Recorded both on the ground and climbing, so this is the larger of the two rules in every dimension.
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 4 in (102 mm), at 4 × 4 × 4 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
Active animals measured in the wild averaged 84 °F (28.9 °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.
3kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 22 g, the heaviest recorded for Bighead Anole — 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
- — Body mass at hatching
- — Longest recorded life
- — 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
- — First breeds from · youngest recorded
- — First breeds by · oldest recorded
- — 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 Anolidae
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). Anolis capito. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/anolis-capito
@misc{anolis_capito_2026,
title = {Anolis capito},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/anolis-capito}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.