Reptilia · Squamata
Cyclura carinataHarlan, 1824
Turks Island Iguana
Photograph by stephen, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A day-active, plant-eating lizard from the Neotropic region, reaching 510 mm snout to vent.
Also called Turks & Caicos Iguana, Turks and Caicos Rock Iguana.
Reptilia › Squamata › Iguanidae › Cyclura
- Grows to
- 510mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Herbivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 14years
Longer than 77% of all iguanas 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 129 to 750 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
- Endangered
- Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
- 2019
- Population trend
- Stable
- Red List criteria
- A2abce; B2ab(ii,iii,iv)
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 14years
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 37.65°C100 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 36.7–38.6°C98–101 °F
Henderson & Powell 2009: 14
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 510mm20 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 228.6mm9 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 228.6mm9 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 79.8mm3.25 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 79.8mm3.25 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 5609.2g12 lb
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 14.6g0.51 oz
max 510 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
How it lives
- Diet
- Herbivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Shrubland, Wetlands
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Coniferous Forests
- Region
- Neotropic
- Mainland or island
- Found only on islands
- Lowest it lives · above sea level
- 11m
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 30m
- Range size
- 153km²
- Density
- 1.7–126.6per hectare
- Home range · largest recorded
- 3060m2
Mesquita et al. 2016
Terrestrial and Arboreal / Saxicolous (Mesquita et al. 2016)
IUCN (0 to 30)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 4.3eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 2–9eggs
- Mean clutch
- 4.3eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 1per year
- Clutches a year
- 1per year
- First breeds at
- 72–84months
mean 4.3 (Pike et al. 2008, Mesquita et al. 2016)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Pleurodonta
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Harlan
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1824
- Type locality
- Turks and Caicos Islands
Keeping one
Turks Island Iguana is assessed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List. Species at risk in the wild are often covered by CITES and by national law, which decide what may be bought, sold, moved across a border or kept at all — and captive-bred and wild-caught animals are usually treated differently. Check the rules where you are before acquiring one. Nothing below is a judgement about keeping this species; it is what a published welfare standard says about space, and what the animal itself was measured doing.
6 ft 8 in × 6 ft 8 in × 6 ft 8 in(204 × 204 × 204 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 20 in (510 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 100 °F (37.7 °C).
Mean body temperature of active individuals measured in nature. A measurement of the animal, not a setting for a thermostat.
Feeding
Prey size does not apply. A herbivore's diet is judged on fibre, on the ratio of calcium to phosphorus, and on avoiding plants high in oxalates.
The animal does not take prey items. This is established practice, not a measurement.
422kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 5,609 g, the heaviest recorded for Turks Island Iguana — 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
- — 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
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Active in
Others in Iguanidae
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). Cyclura carinata. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/cyclura-carinata
@misc{cyclura_carinata_2026,
title = {Cyclura carinata},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/cyclura-carinata}
}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.