Reptilia · Squamata
Psammophis angolensisBocage, 1872
Dwarf Sand Snake
Photograph by Ryan van Huyssteen, CC BY, via iNaturalist
A ground-dwelling, day-active, meat-eating lizard from the Afrotropic region, reaching 500 mm nose to tail.
Reptilia › Squamata › Psammophiidae › Psammophis
- Grows to
- 500mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives
- Terrestrial
Longer than only 5% of all species in Psammophiidae 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 380 to 2,500 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
32 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
- 2014
- Population trend
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- None
- Pupil
- Round
- Venomous
- Yes
- Fangs
- At the back of the mouth
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 352mm14 in
- Length nose to tail · greatest recorded
- 500mm19.5 in
- Hatchling length · nose to tail
- 145mm5.75 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 20.9g0.74 oz
500 mm total length (Feldman et al. 2016), strangely Wilkey and Terrell 2017 say they may reach 750 mm, but 500 mm is large, average is 250-380, and he only measured specimens around 200 mm; Pietersen et al. 2021 (max SVL 320 mm in males, 352 mm in females), Marais 2022 (adults average 25-30 cm, max 50 cm), Trape 2023 (30-50 cm), Spawls et al. 2023(30-50 cm, hatchlings 14-15 cm)
snakes only in this source
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
- Grassland, Savanna
- Biome
- Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
- Region
- Afrotropic
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Elevation · above sea level
- 1200m
- Range size
- 6,541,324km²
mostly lizards, also small frogs (Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Marais 2022), lizards and frogs (Pietersen et al. 2021), arthropods and reptiles (van Huyssteen 2023), lizards (Trape 2023), lizards, lizard eggs and frogs (Spawls et al. 2023)
van Huyssteen 2023, Marais 2022
Shine 1980c, Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021, van Huyssteen 2023, Marais 2022, Trape 2023, Spawls et al. 202
Shine 1980c, van Huyssteen 2023, Marais 2022, Spawls et al. 202
Spawls et al. 2023
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 3.5
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 2–5eggs
Feldman et al. 2015
midpoint of the reported range — Meiri, 2024, Glob. Ecol. Biogeogr., 33:e13812
3-5 (Marais 2005, Wilkey and Terrell 2017, Pietersen et al. 2021, Marais 2022), 2-5 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Serpentes
- Infraorder
- Alethinophidia
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Bocage
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1872
- Type locality
- Angola
Keeping one
4 ft 7 in × 4 ft 7 in × 2 ft 11 in(141 × 141 × 88 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 14 in (352 mm), at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
No preferred body temperature has been recorded for Dwarf Sand Snake. 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 21 g, the heaviest recorded for Dwarf Sand Snake — 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 female mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult male mean
- — Length snout to vent · adult mean
- — 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 · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- — Largest juvenile · shell length
- — Egg length
- — Egg width
- — Body mass · a typical adult
- — Body mass · adult female, mean
- — 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 the young develop
- — Gestation or incubation
- — Mean clutch · smallest reported
- — Mean clutch · largest reported
- — 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
- — Sex decided by
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Density · lowest recorded
- — Density · highest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
Others in Psammophiidae
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). Psammophis angolensis. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/psammophis-angolensis
@misc{psammophis_angolensis_2026,
title = {Psammophis angolensis},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/psammophis-angolensis}
}Sources
- Meiri, S. (2024). SquamBase — a database of squamate (Reptilia: Squamata) traits. Global Ecology and Biogeography. Public domain (CC0).
- Moura, M. R. et al. TetrapodTraits: a database of 33,281 tetrapod species. Used under CC BY 4.0. Observed values only; this encyclopedia does not publish its imputed predictions.
- Catalogue of Life (dataset 3LR), used under CC BY.
- Oskyrko, O. et al. (2024). ReptTraits: a comprehensive dataset of ecological traits in reptiles. Scientific Data. Used under CC BY 4.0.