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Squamata · AgamidaeEntry 12,657 of 21,572
Phuwua Rock Agama, Mantheyus phuwuanensis

Reptilia · Squamata

Mantheyus phuwuanensisManthey & Nabhitabhata, 1991

Phuwua Rock Agama

Photograph by ian_dugdale, CC BY, via Wikimedia Commons

An active by day or night, meat-eating lizard from the Oriental region, reaching 90 mm snout to vent.

Once published as Ptyctolaemus phuwuanensis — those names reach this page.

ReptiliaSquamataAgamidaeMantheyus

Grows to
90mm
greatest recorded
Eats
Carnivorous
Active
Cathemeral
Lives
Arboreal, saxicolous, terrestrial
Body length across Agamidae

Longer than only 46% of all agamids anyone has measured.

46% of 583 species are smaller54% 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

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
Near Threatened
Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
2017
Population trend
Stable
Red List criteria
B1a

The animal itself

Limbs
Four legs
Venomous
No
Fangs
None

Size

Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
90mm3.5 in

max 90 mm SVL (Feldman et al. 2016)

Length snout to vent · adult female mean
82.1mm3.25 in
Largest female · snout to vent
82.1mm3.25 in

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

Body mass · greatestcomputed
24.09g0.85 oz

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

Body mass · adult female, meanmeasured
4.48g0.16 oz

How it lives

Diet
Carnivorous

Arthropods (Das 2010)

Active
Cathemeral

Diurnal / Cathemeral (Das 2010, Teynie and David 2010, Jenssen and Sy 2022) / unclear if diurnal or cathemeral (Ananjeva and Stuart 2001)

Where it lives
Arboreal, saxicolous, terrestrial

Saxicolous and Arboreal (Manthey 2010, Ananjeva and Stuart 2001) / saxicolous and terrestrial (Teynie and David 2010, Chan-ard et al. 2015), saxicolous (Jenssen and Sy 2022)

Habitat
Forest
Biome
Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
Region
Oriental
Mainland or island
Mainland
Elevation · above sea level
200–380m

200-300 (Jenssen and Sy 2022)

Range size
1887km²

Breeding

Reproduction
Oviparous
Average clutch
4eggs
Eggs or young per clutch
4–5eggs

max 4 (Jenssen and Sy 2022)

Mean clutch
4eggs

Naming and history

Suborder
Sauria
Infraorder
Acrodontia
Subspecies
No
Described by
Manthey & Nabhitabhata
Moved to another genus · since it was first described
Yes
Described in
1991
Type locality
Thailand

Keeping one

14 in × 14 in × 14 in(36 × 36 × 36 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 3.5 in (90 mm), at 4 × 4 × 4 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.

No preferred body temperature has been recorded for Phuwua Rock 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.

3kJ per day

Worked out for an animal of 24 g, the heaviest recorded for Phuwua Rock 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 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
  • 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). Mantheyus phuwuanensis. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/mantheyus-phuwuanensis

@misc{mantheyus_phuwuanensis_2026,
  title  = {Mantheyus phuwuanensis},
  author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/mantheyus-phuwuanensis}
}

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.