Animalia > Chordata > Squamata > Varanidae > Varanus > Varanus bengalensis

Varanus bengalensis (Bengal Monitor)

Synonyms:

Wikipedia Abstract

The Bengal monitor (Varanus bengalensis) or common Indian monitor, is a monitor lizard found widely distributed over the Indian Subcontinent, as well as parts of Southeast Asia and West Asia. This large lizard is mainly terrestrial, and its length can range from about 61 to 175 cm from the tip of the snout to the end of the tail. Young monitors may be more arboreal, but adults mainly hunt on the ground, preying mainly on arthropods, but also taking small terrestrial vertebrates, ground birds, eggs and fish. Although large monitors have few predators apart from humans who hunt them for meat, younger individuals are hunted by many predators.
View Wikipedia Record: Varanus bengalensis

Infraspecies

Varanus bengalensis bengalensis (Bengal monitor)
Varanus bengalensis irrawadicus (Bengal monitor)

Attributes

Adult Weight [1]  6.792 lbs (3.081 kg)
Birth Weight [1]  14 grams
Female Weight [1]  2.696 lbs (1.223 kg)
Male Weight [1]  10.891 lbs (4.94 kg)
Weight Dimorphism [1]  303.9 %
Female Maturity [1]  2 years 9 months
Male Maturity [1]  3 years
Gestation [1]  5 months 22 days
Litter Size [1]  20
Litters / Year [1]  1
Maximum Longevity [3]  11 years
Reproductive Mode [2]  Oviparous
Snout to Vent Length [1]  20 inches (51 cm)
Habitat Substrate [2]  Terrestrial

Ecoregions

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
Himalaya Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan No
Indo-Burma Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Viet Nam No
Sundaland Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand No
Western Ghats and Sri Lanka India, Sri Lanka No

Prey / Diet

Prey / Diet Overlap

Competing SpeciesCommon Prey Count
Microhierax caerulescens (Collared Falconet)1
Ploceus philippinus (Baya Weaver)1
Vulpes bengalensis (Bengal Fox)2

Predators

Haliaeetus leucogaster (White-bellied Sea Eagle)[4]
Nisaetus cirrhatus (Crested Hawk-Eagle)[4]

Consumers

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 2Meiri, Shai (2019), Data from: Traits of lizards of the world: variation around a successful evolutionary design, Dryad, Dataset, https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.f6t39kj
♦ 3de Magalhaes, J. P., and Costa, J. (2009) A database of vertebrate longevity records and their relation to other life-history traits. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 22(8):1770-1774
♦ 4Population Status of Two Varanus species (Reptilia: Sauria: Varanidae) in Sri Lanka’s Puttalam Lagoon System, with Notes on their Diet and Conservation Status, D.M.S. SURANJAN KARUNARATHNA, A.A. THASUN AMARASINGHE, MAJINTHA B. MADAWALA & H.K. DUSHANTHA KANDAMBI, Biawak, 6(1), pp. 22-33 2012
♦ 5Gibson, D. I., Bray, R. A., & Harris, E. A. (Compilers) (2005). Host-Parasite Database of the Natural History Museum, London
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0