Reptilia · Squamata
Lacerta trilineataBedriaga, 1886
Balkan Green lizard
Photograph by Tigran Tadevosyan, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A day-active, omnivorous lizard from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 174 mm snout to vent.
Also called Balkan Emerald Lizard.
Reptilia › Squamata › Lacertidae › Lacerta
- Grows to
- 174mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Omnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 7.8years
Longer than 98% of all species in Lacertidae 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 35 to 444 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
44 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
- 2008
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 7.8years
- Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradientmeasured
- 32.9–34.2°C91–94 °F
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 31.8°C89 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 31.9–32.3°C89–90 °F
Slavens and Slavens 1999, Jesus 2012: 7 and 9 months, Foufopoulos and Ives 1999 (6 years, field),
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 174mm6.75 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 110.7mm4.25 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 110.7mm4.25 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 42mm1.75 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 42mm1.75 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 117.2g4.1 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 0.7g0.02 oz
max 174 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
- Omnivorous
- How it hunts
- Active foraging
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, saxicolous, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Shrubland
- Biome
- Mediterranean
- Active season · months of the year
- 7–9months
- Region
- Saharo-Sindian
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 2000m
- Range size
- 596,682km²
- Density
- 81per hectare
invertebrates and small lizards, occasionally fruit (Szczerbak), arthropods and regularly fruit and flowers (Valakos et al. 2008), also snails (Valakos et al. 2004), arthropods (Mollov and Petrova 2013), mostly arthropods, some plants (~10-30%, Sagonas et al. 2014, Fig. 7), arthropods and gastropods (Sagonas et al. 2015, +9-38% stomachs with plant material), omnivore: fruit, invertebrates, lizards and small rodents (Stille and Stille 2017), Anguis graeca (Christopoulos et al. 2020)
Panayiotis Pafilis, pers. comm, May 2015
e.g., sm, pers. Obs.
Terrestrial, Saxicolous and Arboreal
max 2000 (Kwet 2015)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Sex decided by
- Genes, ZW/ZZ
- Average clutch
- 10.39eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 3–30eggs
- Mean clutch
- 8–12.8eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 1.5per year
- Clutches a year
- 1–2per year
5-15, mean 8-10 (Stojanov et al. 2011), up to 20 (Stille and Stille 2017), means for islands: 12.77 ± 2.92 eggs vs. mainland: 9.42 ± 1.87 eggs, range 7-18 in their data and 4-30 in the literature (Sagonas et al. 2019)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Laterata
- Subspecies
- Lacerta trilineata hansschweizeri MÜLLER 1935 Lacerta trilineata major BOULENGER 1887 Lacerta trilineata polylepidota WETTSTEIN 1952 Lacerta trilineata trilineata BEDRIAGA 1886
- Described by
- Bedriaga
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1886
- Type locality
- Greece
Keeping one
2 ft 3 in × 2 ft 3 in × 2 ft 3 in(70 × 70 × 70 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.
Lives on rock, so stable hard surfaces and basking ledges suit it.
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 6.75 in (174 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 91–94 °F (32.9–34.2 °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.
14kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 117 g, the heaviest recorded for Balkan Green lizard — 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
- — Eats arthropods
- — Eats vertebrates
- — Eats plant matter
- — How the young develop
- — Gestation or incubation
- — 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
- — Red List criteria
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Lacertidae
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). Lacerta trilineata. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/lacerta-trilineata
@misc{lacerta_trilineata_2026,
title = {Lacerta trilineata},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/lacerta-trilineata}
}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.