It's baby lizard season in Los Angeles

Side-blotched lizard hatchling in the Baldwin Hills. Stevie Kennedy-Gold/NHMLA.

When I was a roving California correspondent, one of the stories on my list that I rue never getting to was the autumn trek of tarantulas sometimes observed in the Sierra foothills. (And other places where tarantulas mate.) I have a weakness for place stories like this. The Natural History Museum of LA reports on its nature blog that right now is the hatching season for many of Southern California’s lizard species. Most of the young lizards you might see around now belong to one of two species, the Western Fence Lizard and the Side-blotched Lizard.

Nature in LA explains:

Western Fence Lizards are also frequently called “blue belly” lizards because of the bright blue patches on their abdomen and chin. If you are in the L.A. area and see a lizard on a rock doing “push up” displays, it is this lizard. In Southern California, Western Fence Lizards breed in mid to late March and the females lay eggs 2–4 weeks after that. After about two months, these eggs hatch, resulting in the many baby Western Fence Lizards we can observe in late June and July.

Western Fence Lizard females can lay up to three clutches of eggs per year. As a result, we can expect more tiny baby lizards for the next couple of months as subsequent clutches hatch. Hatchlings are about 1 inch long, or “1 inch SVL” in herpetological lingo. SVL stands for snout to vent length. Because many lizard species can easily drop their tails, scientists measure lizard body size excluding the tail. Thus, lizard body size is measured from the tip of the snout to the vent (aka the cloaca).

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Side-blotched Lizards take on a different strategy than Western Fence Lizards. Whereas Western Fence Lizards live for several years, the Side-blotched Lizard is largely an annual species, meaning they tend to live for only about one year. Female Side-blotched Lizards can produce as many as eight clutches with up to eight eggs per clutch!

Like the Western Fence Lizards, Side-blotched Lizards start breeding in mid to late March, lay eggs a few weeks later, and these eggs hatch after 1.5–2 months. The babies are extra small with a SVL of 0.8 to 1 inch. The telltale side-blotch, which is found just behind the armpit, is often not yet very obvious in the babies, as you can see (or really…as you can’t see) in the photo above. To differentiate Western Fence Lizards from Side-blotched Lizards, you often have to use relative scale size; scales are larger and pointier in the Western Fence Lizard, whereas the scales on the backs of Side-blotched Lizards are smaller, almost with a pebble-like appearance.

Also this request from the museum: "As you wander around Southern California, if you see any baby lizards, or any other lizards, snakes, turtles, frogs, or salamanders, please take a photo and email it to rascals@nhm.org." Your observation could be added to the Reptiles and Amphibians of Southern California (RASCals) citizen science project.