Reptilia · Squamata
Aparallactus lunulatusPeters, 1854
Plumbeous or Reticulated Centipede Eater
Photograph by Cole Wolf, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A nocturnal, meat-eating lizard from the Afrotropic region, reaching 535 mm nose to tail.
Reptilia › Squamata › Atractaspididae › Aparallactus
- Grows to
- 535mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Lives
- Fossorial, terrestrial
Longer than only 32% of all species in Atractaspididae 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 200 to 1,280 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
33 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
- 2014
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Colour on the back
- Brown, Gray, Yellow
- Pattern on the back
- Blotched
- Pupil
- Round
- Venomous
- Yes
- Fangs
- At the front of the mouth
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 430mm17 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 535mm21 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 95mm3.75 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 21.27g0.75 oz
535 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), usually 300-400, but may reach 600 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 390 mm in males, 430 mm in females), Marais 2022 (adults average 25-40 cm, max 54 cm), Spawls et al. 2023 (30-52 cm TL, hatchlings 9-10 cm)
snakes only in this source
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Active foraging
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Where it lives
- Fossorial, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Savanna
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2600m
- Range size
- 5,096,016km²
centipedes and scorpions (Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Marais 2022, Malonza and Bwong 2023), arthropods (van Huyssteen 2023)
van Huyssteen 2023
This snake spends the day beneath rocks or logs and emerges at dusk to hunt for centipedes (Broadley and Blaylock 2013), nocturnal (Pietersen et al. 2021, van Huyssteen 2023), sometimes on the surface at night (Spawls et al. 2023)
fossorial (Bars-Closel et al. 2017, Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021), fossorial and terrestrial (van Huyssteen 2023), in holes, sometimes on the surface (Spawls et al. 2023)
NSL-2200 (Bates et al. 2014), below 1000 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017), 0-2200 (Malonza and Bwong 2023), 0-2600 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 3
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 2–4eggs
Feldman et al. 2015
midpoint of the reported range — Meiri, 2024, Glob. Ecol. Biogeogr., 33:e13812
3-4 (Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Branch 1998, Marais 2022), 2-4 (Pietersen et al. 2021, Spawls et al. 2023)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- Aparallactus lunulatus lunulatus (PETERS 1854) Aparallactus lunulatus nigrocollaris CHABANAUD 1916
- Described by
- Peters
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1854
- Type locality
- Mozambique
Keeping one
5 ft 8 in × 5 ft 8 in × 3 ft 6 in(172 × 172 × 108 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better. Substrate at least 8.5 in (22 cm) deep.
The standard sizes ground-dwelling species at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times snout-vent length.
Burrows, so substrate deep enough to dig in matters as much as floor area.
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 17 in (430 mm), at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
No preferred body temperature has been recorded for Plumbeous or Reticulated Centipede Eater. Rather than repeat a number from a care sheet, this page leaves it out.
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 21 g, the heaviest recorded for Plumbeous or Reticulated Centipede Eater — 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 female mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult male mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult mean
- — Female length · mean, nose to tail
- — Length nose to tail · adult male mean
- — Length nose to tail · adult mean
- — Largest female · snout to vent
- — Largest male · snout to vent
- — Largest female · shell length
- — Largest male · shell length
- — Hatchling length · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- — 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
- — Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How the young develop
- — Gestation or incubation
- — Mean clutch · smallest reported
- — Mean clutch · largest reported
- — Clutches in a year
- — Clutches a year · fewest
- — Clutches a year · most
- — 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
- — Body temp in the wild · lowest mean recorded
- — Body temp in the wild · highest mean recorded
- — Sex decided by
- — Population trend
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Atractaspididae
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). Aparallactus lunulatus. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/aparallactus-lunulatus
@misc{aparallactus_lunulatus_2026,
title = {Aparallactus lunulatus},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/aparallactus-lunulatus}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Moura, M. R. et al. TetrapodTraits: a database of 33,281 tetrapod species. Used under CC BY 4.0. Observed values only; this encyclopedia does not publish its imputed predictions.
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.
- Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.