The Southern Alligator Lizard resides predominantly along the Pacific coast, ranging as far north as Washington and as far south as Baja California. Correlation between subspecies and location will vary.
Nonetheless, the primary subspecies of the Southern Alligator Lizard in the LA County Area is the California Alligator Lizard or the Elgaria Multicarinata. However, the North Eastern portion of the LA county, such as the Lancaster and Palmdale area, does not have any species of Southern Alligators Lizards due to the desert like habitat and higher elevations.
Our Study
Southern Alligator Lizard is one of the iconic native species of Los Angeles County. As much of our urban and suburban landscape is dominated by non-native plants and animals, such a species might seem rather unfamiliar to us. Fortunately, we found the following community science project from 2010 to June 2013 which documents citizens’ observations of the lizard.
The Reptiles and Amphibians of Southern California (RASCals; http://www.inaturalist.org/projects/rascals), is a citizen-science project, which was started in June of 2013 by GBP and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. RASCals is hosted on the internet-based citizen-science platform iNaturalist (iNaturalist.org), maintained by the California Academy of Sciences. The RASCals project focuses on reptiles and amphibians within the 10 counties of Southern California: San Luis Obispo, Kern, Santa Barbara, Ventura, Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Orange, Riverside, San Diego, and Imperial Counties.
Specifically, observation consists of a voucher photograph, date, latitude and longitude coordinates, and a community-supported identification.
Based on the RASCals dataset, Southern Alligator Lizard is now the most widespread lizard species in heavily urbanized regions of Southern California including the Los Angeles Basin and San Diego area.
Southern Alligator Lizard 