Reptilia · Squamata
Chamaeleo dilepisLeach, 1819
Flapneck Chameleon
Photograph by Chris Vynbos, CC BY-SA, via iNaturalist
A day-active, meat-eating chameleon from the Afrotropic region, reaching 195 mm snout to vent.
Also called Bocage's Chameleon.
Once published as Chamaeleo quilensis, Chamaeleo roperi, Chamaeleo ruspolii — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Chamaeleonidae › Chamaeleo
- Grows to
- 195mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 8years
Longer than 95% of all chameleons 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 18.2 to 300 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
45 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
- 2013
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 8years
- Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradientmeasured
- 32.8°C
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 31.6°C89 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 31.2–32°C88–90 °F
De Magalhaes & Costa 2009, Slavens and Slavens 1999: 4; LeBerre 2009: over 2; 5-8 (Wikipedia)
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 195mm7.75 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 119.1mm4.75 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 150.6mm6 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 31.5mm1.25 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 31.5mm1.25 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 130.7g4.6 oz
- Body mass · a typical adult
- 22.31g0.79 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 0.47g0.02 oz
max 195 mm SVL (Feldman et al. 2016)
snout-vent length; the source column mixes this with straight carapace length
computed from length by a family-level allometric equation, not weighed
AnAge rates this record "acceptable"
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Grassland, Savanna, Shrubland
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2100m
- Range size
- 11,092,407km²
- Density
- 214–1584per hectare
Arthropods, very few mollusks and lizards (e.g., Reaney et al. 2012), invertebrates and occassionally small vertebrates (Spawls et al. 2018), "virtually any invertebrates" (Pietersen et al. 2021) but lists only insects as "especially" hunted, van Huyssteen 2023 (arthropods and reptiles)
e.g., van Huyssteen 2023
(e.g., Kenya Reptile Atlas (http://kenyareptileatlas.com/, van Huyssteen 2023)
Arboreal and Terrestrial (Pianka 1986) / Arboreal (Jackson and Blackburn 2010, van Huyssteen 2023), but will descend to the ground (Spawls et al. 2018), arboreal, descends to cross areas and lay eggs (Pietersen et al. 2021)
0-1500 (Kenya Reptile Atlas (http://kenyareptileatlas.com/, Loader et al. 2004, Spawls et al. 2023), sea level to about 1500-1800 (Spawls et al. 2018), 0-1200, quilmes to 1750, roperi to 2100 (Malonza and Bwong 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Gestation or incubation
- 30days
- Average clutch
- 39.6eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 2–77eggs
- Mean clutch
- 35–44.2eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 1per year
- Clutches a year
- 1per year
- First breeds at
- 9–12months
2-65 in Patrick et al. 2011, 19-74, mean 44.2 in Reaney et al. 2012, who also report a study with 77 eggs, and say Fitch (1970) recorded 95 enlarged follicles, LeBerre 2009: 20-40 (also Spawls et al. 2023), Pakenham 1983 (12-23), up to 57 (Branch 2014), up to 65 but usually 20-40 (Kenya Reptile Atlas (http://kenyareptileatlas.com/), up to 57 (Branch 2016), on average 20-40 but up to 73 (Spawls et al. 2018), 73 (Reissig and Boshoff 2013; n=1), 30-40 (Pietersen et al. 2021)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Acrodontia
- Subspecies
- Chamaeleo dilepis dilepis LEACH 1819 Chamaeleo dilepis idjwiensis LOVERIDGE 1942 Chamaeleo dilepis isabellinus GÜNTHER 1893 Chamaeleo dilepis martensi MERTENS 1964 Chamaeleo dilepis petersii GRAY 1865 Chamaeleo dilepis quilensis BOCAGE 1866 Chamaeleo dilepis roperi BOULENGER 1890 Chamaeleo dilepis ruspolii BOETTGER 1893
- Described by
- Leach
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1819
- Type locality
- Democratic Republic of the Congo
Keeping one
2 ft 7 in × 2 ft 7 in × 2 ft 7 in(78 × 78 × 78 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 7.75 in (195 mm), at 4 × 4 × 4 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
In a laboratory thermal gradient this species settled at 91 °F (32.8 °C).
Preferred body temperature, recorded in a laboratory gradient where the animal could choose freely. 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.
15kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 131 g, the heaviest recorded for Flapneck Chameleon — 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.
Morphs
1 with peer-reviewed genetics behind them, 0 resting on breeder consensus. Most references present both with the same confidence.
- Skin colourpeer reviewed
- Genetic and behavioural factors affecting interpopulation colour pattern variation in two congeneric chameleon species. — R Soc Open Sci 2024
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 · adult female, mean
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How the young develop
- — 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
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Chamaeleonidae
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). Chamaeleo dilepis. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/chamaeleo-dilepis
@misc{chamaeleo_dilepis_2026,
title = {Chamaeleo dilepis},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/chamaeleo-dilepis}
}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.
- AnAge, Human Ageing Genomic Resources (de Magalhães et al.), used under CC BY 3.0.