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I was out hiking today with a few friends when we found this beautiful Alligator Lizard. It took us about 15 minutes to catch (I had no hunting tools with me, and it kept escaping into piles of rotted wood). I believe this is a female Southern. Can anyone here correct me if I’m wrong?

This Alligator Lizard has ticks around its ears and neck, so I’m keeping it for a few weeks or so in order to get rid of the ticks (they are actually nymphs, not full-grown ticks). The ticks can be seen in the following picture:

The dirt is stuck to the Alligator Lizard due to some Petroleum Jelly that I put on the ticks to suffocate them (usually they fall off and die quickly without me having to pull them off). I will be rinsing the Alligator Lizard off soon. I have the Alligator Lizard in this smaller cage temporarily, while it heals. The cage is being used as quarantine, since I lined the top of it with Petroleum Jelly (I don’t want ticks crawling around my room, so this way they will die trying to escape the cage).

I'm excited to have this new Alligator Lizard, so I had to post about it.

Yes that appears to be a E. Multicarinata. Were did you collect it? In my local we have been observing a much larger number of this species out and in the opened this year.

My reptile research and collection

I caught this Alligator Lizard in Carmel Valley, near Garland Ranch, if you know where that is. I too have seen more Alligator Lizards of this type more than previous years. I don't know what the breeding season is for them, but my guess would be that it's around this time. I seem to be finding all adult Alligator Lizards lately, so maybe they are all out searching for mates. I have yet to find any younger Alligator Lizards!

I was actually amazed to find this Alligator Lizard with a full tail. I've caught many Alligator Lizards in the past, but only 2 of them (including this one) have had full tails.

Where do you live? I'm guessing you are somewhere close in CA, since you seem to be finding the same species as me.

It does look like a female southern al. A lot of females captured this time of year are gravid. Your girl looks kind of heavy so I'd make sure she has a moist spot in the tank where she can lay her eggs.

-Alice

How were you able to put on the vasaline stuff on the alli? Did it try to bite you? I know my large red alli tries to multilate my finger whenever i clean the cage.

Also, if you have seriously mite/tick problems, then i highly recommend getting the Natural Chemitry Natural Tick remover. It kills the mites without hurting permanently the lizard. But if you do use it, make sure you have one of those water droppers so you can put the drops where you need em. I accidentally got some in his eyes once, and it looked like what would happen if i got heavily chlorinated water in my eyes >_

It wasn't hard to put the petroleum jelly on the Alligator Lizard. I just hold its mouth closed with my thumb and pointer finger (my thumb on the top of its head and the pointer finger under its mouth) to prevent being bit. I wrap the rest of my fingers around the Alligator Lizards body to keep it still. When held like this, they usually stop struggling after the first 5 seconds and calm down. I was bitten many times by the first Alligator Lizard I owned, but have since learned how to properly handle them. The last 2 Alligator Lizards that I've kept haven't been able to bite me at all (and I'm glad, since they were both full-grown and wild caught). Just remember to keep your fingers away from the sides of their mouths when they are angry.

The thought of her laying eggs occurred to me last night, when I was thinking of how fat she is compared to her skinny tail. She probably will lay eggs if you have the same suspicions, Aliceinwl. I will search up how to properly take care of the eggs if she lays any, but do you have any tips in the meantime? I've never had an Alligator Lizard lay eggs before. Do you think it's ok if I keep her in the small cage until her tick problem is cured? Should I spray water under her hiding spot for her to lay the eggs? Is there a way to tell if the eggs are fertilized or not?

I could always look these questions up if you don't feel like answering them, but any help would be great.

You can and should use Vermiculite in a sterile container such as a small Tupperware container with a hole cut in it for her to get in to lay. I am not sure how moist the Vermiculite would be I am sure Alice can answer that one. Vermiculite is getting harder to acquire do to the hazards of mining it so a good substitute would be Perlite witch can be found at virtually any Wal-Mart in the Garden section. Just a note. You should have a home for the young before they hatch. If you have trouble finding a home let me know and I will take as many as you need to get rid of. It would be nice to have a genetic strand from another area to breed

My reptile research and collection

For ticks, I just take a small tweezers and remove them all (on some als I've ended up removing over 60). This method gives immediate gratification. In terms of providing a laying spot, take a plastic container such as a coolwhip container, cut a hole about midway up, and fill the lower protion with a moist substrate (it should be damp, but not wet; about 1:1 substrate to water by weight). I like to use the ground cocconut fiber substrates like bed-a-beast, eco-earth etc for the hide. Once the eggs are laid, I remove them and incubate in vermiculite. It is a good idea to supplement your female's food with a calcium supplement like repti-cal.

In the past, I've set up females in a small reptile ranch type of enclosure with paper towels as a substrate, a food dish, a water dish, and the afore mentioned hide. They laid their eggs without incident.

Unless your girl also has a mite problem, I'd recommend cleaning off the vasaline and manually removing the ticks. The vasaline would probably get pretty messy if your female was to enter a hide like the one I described.

-Alice

Just a note on commercial mite and tick killers. Very few are safe for use on lizards. They can also lead to death and deformity of eggs and offspring. So, I would not recommend them for a gravid female lizard.

Like I said ticks can be removed manually.

If you have mites, soak your lizard for 15 minutes a day, remove all the mites you can find. Clean and disinfect the cage daily. Throw out the substrate, wash the cage and hides with a bleach solution. You will have to replace the substrate in the moist hide too. I have run into mite problems regularly with als, but the majority of them don't have any. Usually two weeks of the soaking / cleaning regime will fix the problem. Look for mites around the neck, in the ears, corners of the mouth, behind the legs, and around the cloaca. Unlike ticks, you'll frequently see the mites just crawling around on the lizard.

-Alice

I'm glad you just posted that about the mite killers, but I'm afraid I've already used some Black Knight Roach Killer on the lizard’s cage with my Alligator Lizard in it. She was in the cage for about 10 minutes until I read your post. I pulled her out and quickly rinsed her off, so I hope that was enough.

The man that I bought the Black Knight Roach Killer from told me that they've been using the Black Knight Roach Killer on all their lizards for years with no problems. I'm sure my lizard will be alright, but hopefully the eggs won't be deformed (if my lizard is even pregnant that is). I told the man she was pregnant and he said it should be ok, but I guess I'll have to find out...

I think with a short term exposure, she should be fine. the people I knew who ran into problems had used the stuff for more extended periods.

-Alice

Well that's good to hear. I just hope I haven't done anything to her eggs by using that stuff.

I decided to pull the ticks out with forceps, which I absolutely hate doing. I really have no idea if I got the heads of the ticks out of the lizard. I tried my best to pull them out slowly and twisted them counter-clockwise, but some were dead when I pulled them out. I hope this just means that I squeezed them too hard and didn't break their heads off. I did, however, put a little rubbing alcohol on the spots that I pulled the ticks out (using a Q-tip). Hopefully those spots don’t become infected. I’ll be really mad at myself if something bad happens to my lizard or her eggs.

Usually with ticks there's no need to twist, just grip them gently and pull them straight out. In terms of infections, I've never had any problems. If you're worried, you can put a little neosporin on the site.

-Alice

Out of all the E. Multicarinata I have observed or collected this year only one individual has had a “regrown” tail. The rest have had there full tails. You are correct about the breeding season however my research is showing me that prime breeding season is coming to and end now which would explain why I have been less than lucky in observing anymore since my last post. I reside in Amador County Ca. More specifically near Lake Comanche. Do you know where that is?

My reptile research and collection

Well, I moved my Alligator Lizard to a bigger cage yesterday. She just now explored a little and found the basking spot. Here is a picture of the cage setup:

Here are some pictures of her basking under the heat lamp:

I thought I got all the ticks off her, but I saw another one crawling out of her ear while she was basking. I got it off, but I hope there aren't anymore. I don't have her in a "quarantined" cage anymore, so I'm worried the ticks will crawl out of the cage and go into my room. Hopefully that was the last one...