Reptilia · Squamata
Stenodactylus doriaeBlanford, 1874
Dune Sand Gecko
Photograph placed in the public domain, CC0, via iNaturalist
A ground-dwelling, nocturnal, meat-eating gecko from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 83 mm snout to vent.
Also called Middle Eastern Short-fingered Gecko.
Once published as Ceramodactylus doriae — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Gekkonidae › Stenodactylus
- Grows to
- 83mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Carnivorous
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Lives up to
- 9.3years
Longer than 79% 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
43 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
- Stable
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 9.3years
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 23.2°C74 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 18.2–28.2°C65–83 °F
Amitai and Bouskila 2001: > 8, Werner et al. 1993: 8 years, 10 months; TAU museum records: 8 years and 11 months, Yael Olek pers comm.: usually 3 years; A specimen collected as adult in Hatzeva field school in late March 2015 died 8 years and 7 month later (late October 2023), so at least 9 years and 3 months
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 83mm3.25 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 63.2mm2.5 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 63.2mm2.5 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 28mm1 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 28mm1 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 11.39g0.4 oz
- Body mass · adult female, meanmeasured
- 6.43g0.23 oz
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 0.36g0.01 oz
max 83 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
How it lives
- Diet
- Carnivorous
- How it hunts
- Mixed
- Active
- Nocturnal
- Where it lives
- Terrestrial
- Habitat
- Desert
- Biome
- Deserts & Xeric Shrublands
- Region
- Saharo-Sindian
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 500m
- Range size
- 2,966,792km²
- Density
- 16per hectare
invertebrates and small geckos, termites (Werner 2016, also note juvenile agamid in captivity), Archnids and insects (Kamali 2020), arthropods (Carranza et al. 2021)
(Arnold 1984), sit and wait (Gardner 2013)
(e.g., Werner 2016, Disi and Amr 1998, Kamali 2020, Carranza et al. 2021)/ afternoon (Nader and Jawdat 1976)
e.g., Nader and Jawdat 1976, Disi and Amr 1998, Kamali 2020, Carranza et al. 2021
135 BELOW sea level (Bouskila et al. 1992), 0-500 (Carranza et al. 2021)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 1.81eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 1–2eggs
- Mean clutch
- 1.61–2eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 3.5per year
- Clutches a year
- 1–5per year
- First breeds at
- 8months
1 or more usually 2 (Gardner 2013), 1-2 (7 of 1, 11 of 2, Olek, pers comm.), mean 2 (Werner 1995), 2, sometimes 1 (Werner 2016), 3 had 2, one had 1 egg (Goldberg and Maza 2019), 1-2 (Carranza et al. 2021)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Gekkota
- Subspecies
- No
- Described by
- Blanford
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1874
- Type locality
- Iran
Keeping one
13 in × 13 in × 8.25 in(33 × 33 × 21 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 3.25 in (83 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 74 °F (23.2 °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.
2kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 11 g, the heaviest recorded for Dune Sand 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 · 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
- — Sex decided by
- — Red List criteria
- — Active season · shortest recorded
- — Active season · longest recorded
- — Home range · largest recorded
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
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). Stenodactylus doriae. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/stenodactylus-doriae
@misc{stenodactylus_doriae_2026,
title = {Stenodactylus doriae},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/stenodactylus-doriae}
}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.