Reptilia · Squamata
Pristurus rupestrisBlanford, 1874
Persia Rock Gecko
Photograph by Kseniia Marianna Prondzynska, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A day-active, meat-eating gecko from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 26 mm snout to vent.
Also called Blanford’s Semaphore Gecko.
Reptilia › Squamata › Sphaerodactylidae › Pristurus
- Grows to
- 26.2mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 4.9years
Longer than only 12% of all species in Sphaerodactylidae 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 17 to 150 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
39 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
- 2012
- Population trend
- Increasing
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 4.9years
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 37°C99 °F
Slavens and Slavens 1999
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 26.2mm1 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 23.64mm0.9 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 15.75mm0.6 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 15.8mm0.6 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 0.81g0.03 oz
max 32 mm SVL (Feldman et al. 2016) but Burriel-Carranza et al. 2023a split it and set the maxima at 26.23
largely converted from length by allometry in the source
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Arboreal, saxicolous, terrestrial
- Habitat
- Desert
- Biome
- Deserts & Xeric Shrublands
- Active season · months of the year
- 12months
- Region
- Saharo-Sindian
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 3000m
- Range size
- 884,260km²
- Density
- 44.4per hectare
Arthropods (over 60% ants, Arnold 1993), Archnids and insects (Kamali 2020), arthropods (Carranza et al. 2021)
e.g., Gardner 2013
Diurnal, occasionally active after dark (Gardner 2013), Diurnal (e.g., Koleska 2018, Disi and Amr 1998, Kamali 2020), "A mainly diurnal rock dwelling species, it can also be seen active after sunset" (Carranza et al. 2021)
Saxicolous and Arboreal / Saxicolous and Terrestrial (Loveridge 1947), saxicolous, arboreal and edificarian (Carranza et al. 2021)
0-2350 (Carranza et al. 2021)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 1eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 1eggs
- Mean clutch
- 1eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 1.5per year
- Clutches a year
- 1–2per year
e.g., Kamali 2020
e.g., Gardner 2013, Carranza et al. 2021
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Gekkota
- Subspecies
- Pristurus rupestris guweirensis HAAS 1943 Pristurus rupestris rupestris BLANFORD 1874
- Described by
- Blanford
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- No
- Described in
- 1874
- Type locality
- Oman
Keeping one
4.25 in × 4.25 in × 4.25 in(11 × 11 × 11 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 1 in (26.2 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 99 °F (37 °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.
0kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 1 g, the heaviest recorded for Persia Rock 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 female · snout to vent
- — 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
- — Body mass at hatching
- — Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradient
- — 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
- — 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
- — Red List criteria
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Sphaerodactylidae
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). Pristurus rupestris. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/pristurus-rupestris
@misc{pristurus_rupestris_2026,
title = {Pristurus rupestris},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/pristurus-rupestris}
}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.