Reptilia · Squamata
Ophisops elegansMénétries, 1832
Snake-eyed Lizard
Photograph by Edoardo Nardelli, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A ground-dwelling, day-active, meat-eating lizard from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 62 mm snout to vent.
Reptilia › Squamata › Lacertidae › Ophisops
- Grows to
- 62mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 9years
Longer than only 31% 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
- 9years
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 31.3°C88 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 29.5–33.1°C85–92 °F
Arakelyan et al. 2011: 5, Gharzi and Yari 2013: 5; changes with populations, to 6 (Parlak and Tok 2013, Kumas and Ayaz 2014), Foufopoulos and Ives 1999 (4 years), a specimen I collected as an adult in Meron Field school on June 2012 survived in the Zoological Garden in TAU until September 2018, so 7 at least (Maza et al. 2020), Tok et al. 2013 (max 6 in nature), 5-6 (Nassar and Hraoui-Bloquet 2020), Arakelyan 2012: 5, Guler and Uzum 2022 (9 years in nature)
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 62mm2.5 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 45.9mm1.75 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 46.6mm1.75 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 21.85mm0.9 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 21.9mm0.9 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 5.58g0.2 oz
- Body mass · adult female, meanmeasured
- 2.53g0.09 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 0.2g0.01 oz
max 62 mm SVL (Szczerbak 2003)
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
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Active foraging
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Terrestrial
- Habitat
- Forest, Grassland, Shrubland
- Biome
- Temperate Broadleaf & Mixed Forests
- Active season · months of the year
- 7–12months
- Region
- Saharo-Sindian
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 3000m
- Range size
- 2,393,036km²
Arthropods (e.g., Perez-Mellado et al. 1993, "It feeds on spiders, ants, cicadas, beetles, locusts, butterflies, and caterpillars" Szczerbak 2003, arachnids and insects: Kamali 2020), "insects and other invertebrates" (Werner 2016), see details in Tok et al. 2016, 99/5 arthropods, 0.7% gastropods (Akkaya and Ugurtas 2006)
Active foraging
Diurnal and Crepuscular (e.g., Schleich 1987), Diurnal (e.g., pers. obs., Kamali 2020, Dunayev and Orlova 2023, Spawls et al. 2023), twilight in summer (Spawls et al. 2023)
e.g., pers obs., Werner 2016, Kamali 2020, Spawls et al. 2023
0-1850 (Werner 2016), max 800 (Kwet 2015), max 1800 (pers. obs.), 2000 (Nassar et al. 2017, Nassar and Hraoui-Bloquet 2020), 148-1800 (Dunayev and Orlova 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Sex decided by
- Genes, ZW/ZZ
- Average clutch
- 3.57eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 1–8eggs
- Mean clutch
- 3.14–4eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 3per year
- Clutches a year
- 1–4per year
- First breeds at
- 12–36months
3-6 (Bar and Haimovitch 2012, Szczerbak 2003, Arakelyan 2012, Dunayev and Orlova 2023, Spawls et al. 2023), 2-6 (Speybroeck et al. 2016, Kwet 2015), 2-6, mean 4 (Stojanov et al. 2011), 1-5, mean 3.14 on Lesbos (Perez-Mellado et al. 1993), means per oviduct 1.33-5.33 (Torki 2007, who also report 12 eggs in oviducts), mean 4 (Werner 1995), 2-8 (Werner 2016), 2-5, mean 3.2 (Nassar and Hraoui-Bloquet 2020)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Laterata
- Subspecies
- Ophisops elegans basoglui BARAN & BUDAK 1978 Ophisops elegans blanfordi SCHMIDT 1939 Ophisops elegans budakibarani TOK, AFSAR, YAKIN, AYAZ & ÇİÇEK 2017 Ophisops elegans centralanatoliae BODENHEIMER 1944 Ophisops elegans ehrenbergii (WIEGMANN 1835) Ophisops elegans elegans MÉNÉTRIÉS 1832 Ophisops elegans macrodactylus BERTHOLD 1840 Ophisops elegans schlueteri BOETTGER 1880
- Described by
- Ménétries
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1832
- Type locality
- Azerbaijan
Keeping one
9.75 in × 9.75 in × 6 in(25 × 25 × 16 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.
The standard sizes ground-dwelling species at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times snout-vent length.
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 2.5 in (62 mm), at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
Active animals measured in the wild averaged 88 °F (31.3 °C).
Mean body temperature of active individuals measured in nature. 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.
1kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 6 g, the heaviest recorded for Snake-eyed 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
- — 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
- — Red List criteria
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — 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). Ophisops elegans. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/ophisops-elegans
@misc{ophisops_elegans_2026,
title = {Ophisops elegans},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/ophisops-elegans}
}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.