Reptilia · Squamata
Uromastyx aegyptiaForskål, 1775
Egyptian Mastigure
Photograph placed in the public domain, CC0, via iNaturalist
A ground-dwelling, day-active, plant-eating lizard from the Saharo-Sindian region, reaching 418 mm snout to vent.
Also called Egyptian Spiny–tailed Lizard, Leptien’s Mastigure (leptieni).
Once published as Uromastix aegyptius, Uromastyx aegyptius, Uromastyx leptieni, Uromastyx microlepis — those names reach this page.
Reptilia › Squamata › Agamidae › Uromastyx
- Grows to
- 418mm
- greatest recorded
- Eats
- Herbivorous
- Active
- Diurnal
- Lives up to
- 33years
Longer than 100% of all agamids 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 32 to 418 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
48 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
- Vulnerable
- Status assessed · the year the Red List last looked
- 2012
- Population trend
- Decreasing
- Red List criteria
- A2abcd+4abcd
The animal itself
- Limbs
- Four legs
- Venomous
- No
- Fangs
- None
- Longest recorded life
- 33years
- Preferred body temperature · chosen in a laboratory gradientmeasured
- 38°C
- Body temperature when active · measured in the wild
- 40.15°C104 °F
- Body temp in the wild · mean, when active
- 36.3–42.8°C97–109 °F
15.3 (Carey and Judge 2000, De Magalhaes & Costa 2009, Wilms 2005, Slavens and Slavens 1999, Moldowan et al. 2022), 33 (Bringsoe 1998), Amitai and Bouskila 2001: 20, Werner 2016 (at least 20 years in nature; same in Spawls et al. 2023)
mean body temperature of active individuals in nature
body temperature of active animals in nature
Size
- Length snout to vent · greatest recorded
- 418mm16.5 in
- Length snout to vent · adult female mean
- 318.3mm12.5 in
- Largest female · snout to vent
- 318.3mm12.5 in
- Hatchling length · snout to vent
- 59mm2.25 in
- Largest juvenile · snout to vent
- 59mm2.25 in
- Body mass · greatestcomputed
- 2836.3g6.3 lb
- Body mass · a typical adult
- 851.7g1.9 lb
- Body mass · adult female, meanmeasured
- 882g1.9 lb
- Body mass at hatchingmeasured
- 10.4g0.37 oz
Shai Meiri, unpublished; max 375 (Carranza et al. 2021; U. aegyptia leptieni, max 400 in microlepis)
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
- Herbivorous
- How it hunts
- Sit and wait
- Active
- Diurnal
- Where it lives
- Terrestrial
- Habitat
- Desert, Rocky, Shrubland
- Biome
- Deserts & Xeric Shrublands
- Active season · months of the year
- 10–12months
- Region
- Saharo-Sindian
- Mainland or island
- Mainland
- Highest it lives · above sea level
- 1000m
- Range size
- 3,447,327km²
- Density
- 0.1–6.3per hectare
- Home range · largest recorded
- 33,733m2
(e.g., Masood and Asiry 2012, Cunningham 2000, Kamali 2020; Werner 2016, "but will take beetles", Gallagher 1971, juveniles take Arthropods, Arnold 1984, 1.2% of pellets contain insect remains (Cunningham 2000), Foley et al. 1992), evidence for scavanging (Castilla et al. 2011, "84% of the faeces (n ¼ 247) contained exclusively plant material. Grains of barley (Hordeum vulgare) were present... We also found remains of invertebrates, vertebrates and stones in the lizard faeces" , primarily herbivorous (Carranza et al. 2021)
Sit-and-wait (Cavalcanti et al. 2023)
(e.g., pers. obs., Al-Sayegh 2017: "during April (early season) the time at which the dhubs started their activity ranged between 1300 and 1400. During August (end of season), this afternoon activity start time shifted to 1500 to 1600", bimodal: morning and afternoon (Cunningham 2000), Diurnal: bimodal to unimodal, details change with season (Wilms et al. 2009), diurnal (Shai Meiri pers. obs., heliophile; also Carranza et al. 2021; Kamali 2020, Albarwari 2021)
e.g., pers. obs., Werner 2016, Spawls et al. 2023
18-47 (Mohammed et al. 2015), 278 (Cunningham 2000), 0-1000 (Carranza et al. 2021), sea level to 1500 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Breeding
- Reproduction
- Oviparous
- Average clutch
- 20.8eggs
- Eggs or young per clutch
- 3–41eggs
- Mean clutch
- 20.8eggs
- Clutches in a year
- 0.88per year
- Clutches a year
- 0.75–1per year
- First breeds at
- 48–72months
15-41 (Bar and Haimovitch 2012), 17-41 (Wilms 2005, Werner 2016), up to 40 (Wilms et al. 2011), 13-30, mean 20.8 (TAU experimental zoo data), 7-41 (Mendelssohn and Bouskila 1989), 10-40 (Carranza et al. 2021), 13-41 (Spawls et al. 2023)
Naming and history
- Suborder
- Sauria
- Infraorder
- Acrodontia
- Subspecies
- Uromastyx aegyptia aegyptia (FORSKAL 1775) Uromastyx aegyptia microlepis ARNOLD 1980 Uromastyx aegyptia leptieni WILMS & BÖHME 2000
- Described by
- Forskål
- Moved to another genus · since it was first described
- Yes
- Described in
- 1775
- Type locality
- Egypt
Keeping one
Egyptian Mastigure is assessed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. Species at risk in the wild are often covered by CITES and by national law, which decide what may be bought, sold, moved across a border or kept at all — and captive-bred and wild-caught animals are usually treated differently. Check the rules where you are before acquiring one. Nothing below is a judgement about keeping this species; it is what a published welfare standard says about space, and what the animal itself was measured doing.
5 ft 6 in × 5 ft 6 in × 3 ft 5 in(167 × 167 × 105 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 16.5 in (418 mm), at 4 × 4 × 2.5 times it, following the German federal welfare standard — how this is worked out.
In a laboratory thermal gradient this species settled at 100 °F (38 °C).
Preferred body temperature, recorded in a laboratory gradient where the animal could choose freely. A measurement of the animal, not a setting for a thermostat.
Feeding
Prey size does not apply. A herbivore's diet is judged on fibre, on the ratio of calcium to phosphorus, and on avoiding plants high in oxalates.
The animal does not take prey items. This is established practice, not a measurement.
230kJ per day
Worked out for an animal of 2,836 g, the heaviest recorded for Egyptian Mastigure — 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
- — 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
- — Active in
- — Lowest it lives · above sea level
Others in Agamidae
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). Uromastyx aegyptia. Retrieved 2026-09-08, from https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/uromastyx-aegyptia
@misc{uromastyx_aegyptia_2026,
title = {Uromastyx aegyptia},
author = {{The Reptile & Amphibian Encyclopedia}},
year = {2026},
url = {https://www.allanglescreatures.com/species/uromastyx-aegyptia}
}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.