Reptilia · Squamata
Phelsuma madagascariensisGray, 1831
Madagascar Day Gecko
Photograph by Josiah Londerée, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A tree-dwelling, day-active, omnivorous gecko from the Madagascan region, reaching 120 mm snout to vent.
Reptilia › Squamata › Gekkonidae › Phelsuma
- Grows to
- 120mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Omnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 13.6years
Longer than 96% of all geckos 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 23 to 220 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
- 2011
- Population trend
- Decreasing
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 13.6years
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 31.55°C89 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 29.9–33.2°C86–92 °F
Carey and Judge 2000, De Magalhaes & Costa 2009, Slavens and Slavens 1999: 10, Loveridge 1942: >3 years, Hallmann and Griebeler 2015: 13.6
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 120mm4.75 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 86.2mm3.5 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 86.2mm3.5 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 27.5mm1 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 30mm1.25 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 31.52g1.1 oz
- Body mass · a typical adult
- 20.7g0.73 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 0.8g0.03 oz
max 120 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
- Omnivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal
- Habitat
- Forest
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests
- Region
- Madagascan
- Mainland or island
- Found only on islands
- Elevation · above sea level
- 70–1000m
- Range size
- 79,711km²
- Density
- 75–233per hectare
Arthropods / insects and fruit (Schonecker 2008, for both madagascariensis, Kochi and grandis)
Sit and Wait
e.g., Bauer and Russell 1992
max 1000 (Hallmann and Griebeler 2015)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Sex decided by
- Temperature
- Average clutch
- 1.88eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 1–2eggs
- Mean clutch
- 1.75–2eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 5per year
- Clutches a year
- 4–6per year
- First breeds at
- 12–15months
2 (Van Wilgen and Richardson 2012), 1.75 (Hallmann and Griebeler 2015)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Gekkota
- Subspecies
- Phelsuma madagascariensis boehmei MEIER 1982 Phelsuma madagascariensis madagascariensis (GRAY 1831)
- Described by
- Gray
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1831
- Type locality
- Madagascar
Keeping one
19 in × 12 in × 19 in(48 × 30 × 48 cm)
Minimum length × width × height, for one animal. Bigger is always better.
The standard sizes climbing species at 4 × 2.5 × 4 times snout-vent length.
Lives in vegetation, so height and climbing structure matter more than floor space.
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 4.75 in (120 mm), at 4 × 2.5 × 4 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
Active animals measured in the wild averaged 89 °F (31.6 °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.
4kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 32 g, the heaviest recorded for Madagascar Day Gecko — 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 · 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
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
Others in Gekkonidae
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). Phelsuma madagascariensis. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/phelsuma-madagascariensis
@misc{phelsuma_madagascariensis_2026,
title = {Phelsuma madagascariensis},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/phelsuma-madagascariensis}
}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.