Varanus brevicauda belongs to the subgenera Odatria. Head and body are pale yellowbrownish to redbrown. Numerous little dark brown or creamy white marks are spread out irregularly over head, body, limbs and tail. The dark marks are bigger on the sides of the body and the tail. An indistinct dark temporal stripe is present occasionally. The coloration of the underside is white. The head scales are small and smooth. 70-100 midbody scale rows are present. The nostril is located at the side of the head, it is situated approximately in the middle between eye and tip of the snout. The tail is more or less round in diameter, sometimes squeezed together from the sides without any keel on top. The length is about the SVL. The lateral scales and the scales on top of the tail show weak keels. The total length is about 25 cm.

The distribution of V. brevicauda extends from the west coast of Australia in the area of Carnarvon through the center up to the border of Queensland. It is well adapted to the try habitat of the center with sand dunes and spear grass (Spinifex) (MERTENS 1942d, 1958, KEAST 1959, WORRELL 1966, BUSTARD 1968, SWANSON 1976, STORR 1980, STORR et al. 1983b, WILSON & KNOWLES 1988, HOSER 1989, COGGER 1992, EHMANN 1992, JAMES 1996).
In the wild this monitor feeds almost on insects, which it overpowers during his brief surveys through the spear grass. Skinks, dragons and also small geckos are eaten by him (SCHMIDA 1974). They seldom leave the shelter of the hummock grass, because this gives extreme protection from other predators.

This monitor species is not seen often outside of Australia, at least nothing has been reported about this till now. JAMES (1996) noticed on 111 specimen during his study in the wild, that the reproduktive cycle is during the Australian spring. Male animals had testicles extended in the time between July and November while females produced eggs between October and December. The clutch size is between 2 and 3 eggs, but also clutch sizes up to 4-5 eggs were reported. The hatching of the young animals is reported in the wild between January and February. The hatchlings had a SVL of approx. 42 mm (JAMES 1996).
SCHMIDA (1974) published a paper on the keeping of some animals in Australia. He succeeded in breeding them in an indoor enclosure. His keeping experiences show, that the animals of this species are quite aggressive against each other. Also a pairwise keeping does not always seem possibly. Only during the mating period one pair should be kept together.
THOMPSON (1996) describes the breeding of this monitor species. Two females laid together four eggs, each at the beginning of November. After 107-109 days of inkubation in vermiculite (mix 1:1 by weight of substrate to water) two babies from each clutch hatched. The incubation temperature was 29 ± 1°C.
The diet for these monitors consits of small insects in the form of house crickets, crickets, cockroaches and grasshoppers. It is not recommended to feed this species with geckos or other small lizards, although this kind of animals is the major part of the diet in the wild.
The breeding of this species outside Australia is, because of the very strict exportation policy, absolutely impossible. Otherwise you should orientate at the keeping and breeding information of V. storri.