All Angles Creatures
Squamata · AgamidaeEntry 1,837 of 21,572
Ornate Earless Agama, Aphaniotis ornata

Reptilia · Squamata

Aphaniotis ornataLidth de Jeude, 1893

Ornate Earless Agama

Photograph by Daniel Z, CC BY, via iNaturalist

A tree-dwelling, day-active, meat-eating lizard from the Oriental region, reaching 57 mm snout to vent.

Once published as Japalura nasuta — those names reach this page.

ReptiliaSquamataAgamidaeAphaniotis

Grows to
57mm
greatest recorded
Eats
Carnivorous
Active
Diurnal
Lives
Arboreal
Body length across Agamidae

Longer than only 10% of all agamids anyone has measured.

10% of 583 species are smaller90% larger
32 mmthe whole family, smallest to largest418 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 32 to 418 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

30 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
2017

The animal itself

Limbs
Four legs
Venomous
No
Fangs
None

Size

Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
57mm2.25 in

max 57 mm SVL (Feldman et al. 2016)

Length snout to vent · adult female mean
49.7mm2 in
Largest female · snout to vent
49.7mm2 in

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

Body mass · greatestcomputed
5.83g0.21 oz

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

How it lives

Diet
Carnivorous

insects (Das 2010)

Active
Diurnal
Where it lives
Arboreal
Habitat
Forest
Biome
Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
Region
Oriental
Mainland or island
Found only on islands
Elevation · above sea level
150–900m
Range size
26,161km²

Breeding

Reproduction
Oviparous
Average clutch
2eggs
Eggs or young per clutch
2eggs
Mean clutch
2eggs

Naming and history

Suborder
Sauria
Infraorder
Acrodontia
Subspecies
No
Described by
Lidth de Jeude
Moved to another genus · since it was first described
Yes
Described in
1893
Type locality
Malaysia

Keeping one

9 in × 5.75 in × 9 in(23 × 14 × 23 cm)

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

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

Lives in vegetation, so height and climbing structure matter more than floor space.

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 2.25 in (57 mm), at 4 × 2.5 × 4 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.

No preferred body temperature has been recorded for Ornate Earless Agama. 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.

1kJ per day

Worked out for an animal of 6 g, the heaviest recorded for Ornate Earless Agama — 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 · snout to vent
  • Hatchling length · nose to tail
  • 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 it hunts
  • How the young develop
  • Gestation or incubation
  • 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
  • Colour on the back
  • Pattern on the back
  • Pupil
  • 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

Others in Agamidae

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). Aphaniotis ornata. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/aphaniotis-ornata

@misc{aphaniotis_ornata_2026,
  title  = {Aphaniotis ornata},
  author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/aphaniotis-ornata}
}

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.