The specific name, putnami, is in honor of American anthropologist Frederic Ward Putnam.

[4] M. putnami is the type species of the monotypic genus Manolepis.

[2] M. putnami is found in the Mexican states of Chiapas, Colima, Guerrero, Jalisco, Nayarit, and Oaxaca.

The dorsal scales are smooth, without apical pits, and in 19 rows at midbody.

It has 15 small, equal maxillary teeth, followed, after a space, by two enlarged grooved fangs.