 Range in California: Red
Click the map for a guide
to the other subspecies.
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| Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
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| Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
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| Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
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| Adult, San Diego County |
Adult male, San Diego County |
Adult female, San Diego County |
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| Distant adult male in typical basking poisition, Imperial County |
Adult male from lava fields in San Bernardino County © Patrick Briggs |
Adult male with adult female, from lava fields in San Bernardino County
© Patrick Briggs |
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| Adult, Antelope Valley, Los Angeles County © Todd Battey |
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Juvenile, Riverside County
© Jeremiah Easter |
Adult, San Bernardino County
© Loren Prins |
Adult male, San Diego County |
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| Adult from sandstone habitat, San Diego County © Stuart Young |
Hatchling from volcanic rock habitat, Imperial County © Stuart Young |
Juvenile, San Bernardino County
© Ryan Martin |
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A Chuckwalla hook on display at the Death Valley National Park Visitor Center.
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When threatened, a Chuckwalla typically escapes into a rock crevice. If a predator attempts to pull it out, the lizard will use its rough skin and strong claws to wedge itself tightly into the crevice, sometimes inflating with air to further increase its pressure against the rock. The tool shown above - a sharpened stone attached to a stick - was used by Native Americans to pull a Chuckwalla from a crevice. The sharp angled stone impaled the lizard forcing it to release its pressure against the rock allowing it to be pulled out of the crevice. The Chuckwalla was later cooked and eaten or possibly dried and smoked to preserve the meat for later use. See below for more information about cooking Chuckwallas.
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Todd Battey took these pictures in the Coso Range in southern Inyo County, an area known for its extensive Native American pictographs by the Piute tribe.
The large rock contains paintings of deer and bighorn sheep on one side, and human-like forms on the other, including what looks to be a large lizard (the painting is 1.5 feet long) which is certainly a Chuckwalla, considering the importance of this large lizard to these desert inhabitants. |
Habitat |
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| Habitat, San Diego County |
Habitat, Imperial County |
Habitat, San Diego County |
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Habitat, San Bernardino County, with a distant Chuckwalla sitting on top of the rock pile in the center of the picture.
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Habitat, Riverside County |
Artificial riprap habitat, Imperial County |
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Volcanic rock habitat, Imperial County
© Stuart Young |
Sandstone habitat, San Diego County |
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| Short Videos |
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A large old male chuckwalla gets some sun, does some pushups, eats some bushes, then poops. |
A Chuckwalla emerges from its crevice and does a territorial push-up display. |
From a wide view of its habtat, we zoom in on a Chuckwalla high on top of a rock. |
There are more pictures of this species and its habitat on our Southwest and Baja California pages.
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| Description |
| Size |
| 5 - 9 inches long from snout to vent (12.7 - 22.8 cm). (Stebbins 2003) The second largest lizard native to the United States (after the Gila Monster). |
| Appearance |
A large, flat-bodied lizard with a large rounded belly, and a wide-based blunt-tipped tail. The neck and sides of the body are covered with loose folds of skin. Scales are small and granular. Tail will regenerate if detached. Males have enlarged femoral pores.
Color can be black, reddish, gray, brown, yellow, or tan. Several color patterns occur. Color changes with age and varies with the color of the habitat. Some individuals have red torsos. Males have dark, usually black, head, chest, and limbs, with red, black, or yellowish backs. Sometimes the dark coloring is covered with light spots and flecks. The tail and sides are light gray or cream, sometimes reddish. The body and tail of young chuckwallas are more prominently banded with dark and yellow coloring. Females usually retain some of the juvenile body and tail banding. |
| Behavior & Natural History |
Diurnal. Rock-dwelling, sheltering in rock crevices or under rocks. Rocks, especially large outcrops and boulder piles, are used for basking. Chuckwallas are often seen in the morning basking on a large rock pile. After basking, they leave the rocks to forage for food.
Most active from spring through fall, remaining inactive in deep rock crevices during the cold of winter, but may be active all year in warmer areas. Also retreats into rock crevices during extreme heat.
When disturbed, a chukwalla will retreat into a rock crevice, inflating its body with air and using its strong claws and rough skin to tightly wedge itself into the crevice to make extraction difficult. |
| Use as a Food Source |
Gifford, E. W. 1936. Northeastern and Western Yavapai. University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology. Vol. 34, No. 4.pg. 268,
"Extracted from rock crevices by sharp stick twisted into skin; seized by tail and struck against rock to kill. Cooked in hot ashes, either gutted or ungutted."
Jaeger, E. C. 1950. Our Desert Neighbors. Stanford University Press.pg. 220,
"One day long ago, while traveling through the southern Nevada deserts, I came upon three Paiute Indians camping in a rocky gorge. It was late afternoon, and they were sitting around a fire cooking up a half-dozen large chuckwallas in an iron kettle. They had not taken the trouble either to behead or to skin the creatures and as I looking into the boiling pot I had only a feeling of repugnance for food... ...The Indians said they would remove the skin when they ate the lizards."
Wallace, W. J. 1978. The Chuckwalla: A Death Valley Indian Food. The Journal of California Anthropology. Malki Museum, Inc., Morongo Indian Reservation, Banning, California.
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| Diet |
| Eats a variety of vegetation, especially creosote flowers, leaves, fruit, and occasionally insects. |
| Reproduction |
| Breeds from April to June. 5 -16 eggs are laid from June to August. Females may only lay eggs every two or three years. |
| Range |
| Widely distributed throughout the Mojave and Colorado deserts in California, from the desert slopes of the mountains, north through the Owens Valley and east to the Colorado River. Ranges south into Baja California, and east into southern Nevada and Utah, through eastern Arizona and south into Sonora, Mexico. Sea level to around 6,000 ft. (1,800 m). |
| Habitat |
| Inhabits rocky flats and hillsides, lava flows, and large outcrops in the California Mojave and Colorado deserts. Creosote bush is found throughout most of its range.
Although primarily associated with natural rock piles, Chuckwallas have also been observed inhabiting atypical places such as burrows in dirt, piles of railroad ties, and artificial rip rap. |
| Taxonomic Notes |
| In 1998 Hollingsworth (Herpetological Monographs 12: 38-191) changed the name from S. obesus to S. ater. The name S. obesus is still preferred by many researchers. Look at this CNAH page to read about some of the controversy. |
| Conservation Issues (Conservation Status) |
| None. |
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| Taxonomy |
| Family |
Iguanidae |
Iguanian Lizards |
| Genus |
Sauromalus |
Chuckwallas |
Species
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ater |
Common Chuckwalla |
| Original Description |
Sauromalus - Dumeril, 1856 - Arch. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, Vol. 8, p. 535
Sauromalus obesus - Baird, 1858 - Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, Vol. 10, p. 253
from Original Description Citations for the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America © Ellin Beltz
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| Meaning of the Scientific Name |
Sauromalus - Greek - sauros - lizard and homalos - level or flat - refers to the ability to flatten its body
ater - ?
from Scientific and Common Names of the Reptiles and Amphibians of North America - Explained © Ellin Beltz
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| Alternate Names |
Sauromalus obesus - Chuckwalla
Formerly called Sauromalus obesus obesus - Western Chuckwalla
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| Related or Similar California Lizards |
None. Sometimes confused for Gila Monsters, but the differences are obvious on close inspection.
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| More Information and References |
Natureserve Explorer
California Dept. of Fish and Game
Stebbins, Robert C. A Field Guide to Western Reptiles and Amphibians. 3rd Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003.
Behler, John L., & F. Wayne King. The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Reptiles and Amphibians. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992.
Bartlett, R. D. & Patricia P. Bartlett. Guide and Reference to the Turtles and Lizards of Western North America (North of Mexico) and Hawaii. University Press of Florida, 2009.
Jones, Lawrence, Rob Lovich, editors. Lizards of the American Southwest: A Photographic Field Guide. Rio Nuevo Publishers, 2009.
Smith, Hobart M. Handbook of Lizards, Lizards of the United States and of Canada. Cornell University Press, 1946.
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The following status listings come from the Special Animals List which is published several times each year by the California Department of Fish and Game.
This common species is on the Special Animals List for some mysterious reason. There are no indications from the list that it is threatened in any way. In 2007, this lizard was legally collectable with a license.
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Organization
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Status Listing
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| U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) |
None |
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| California Endangered Species Act (CESA) |
None |
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| California Department of Fish and Game |
None |
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| Bureau of Land Management |
None |
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| USDA Forest Service |
None |
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| Natureserve Global Conservation Status Ranks |
G5 |
Secure |
World Conservation Union - IUCN Red List
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None |
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Range in California: Red
