Elgaria multicarinata ID

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FunkyRes
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Joined: June 7th, 2010, 6:19 am
Location: Redding, CA
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Elgaria multicarinata ID

Post by FunkyRes »

The Elgaria multicarinata in Shasta County are definitely different than they are in Bay area.

One noticeable difference is the complete lack of any head mottling.

I finally have gotten a copy of and read Fitch's paper on Elgaria. I need to read it in more detail. The paper I am referring to is this one:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/2420638 (1938 - A Systematic Account of the Alliator Lizards (Gerrhonotus) in the Western United States and Lower California)

He identified Shasta County specimens as California subspecies but he did not identify an intergrade zone, but noted that features in north part of California range started to take on Oregon characteristics. He identified them as California primarily because Oregon had a fairly fixed set of characteristics and California were fairly variable throughout range.

Anyway, after reading his paper, most of the ones I encounter have a California trait that is distinctive of California that (according to the paper) does not occur in Oregon subspecies - red on the back. A few however do not.

I identified this one as Oregon because from what I could tell, every characteristic pointed towards Oregon subspecies -

http://www.naherp.com/viewrecord.php?r_id=42917

Image

Any disagreements from people who have studied Elgaria more closely than I have?

I'm not going just off of the color, but also the amount of keeling on the limbs and tail.

It may soon be moot as it seems that Oregon subspecies may be invalidated anyway (SSAR Herpetological Circular No. 37) due to pesky haplotypes ;) but since the locale for that specimen seems to be outside of Oregon range according to Fitch and range map in Stebbins (it's south eastern Shasta) - I just thought I'd bring that record to attention of people in case they see anything distinctive California subspecies about it.

It's definitely a male, the head was wide and the bite was very painful and I've been bitten enough by Elgaria to sex them that way ;) - anyway, while Elgaria w/o red are not terribly uncommon here near Redding, I don't think I have ever found a male without some obvious red pigment near Redding (but haven't checked all my records).
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