Status
Its decline may have started 2000 years ago with the arrival of humans on La Palma. Until its recent sightings, it was believed to have become extinct in the last 500 years. The main causes of this presumed extinction were believed to have been introduced cats, consumption by the original human population of the Canary Islands, and habitat destruction for agriculture. It is not the only lizard from the Canary Islands to have been considered extinct only to be rediscovered later: This happened with other giant lizards of the Canary Islands, like the El Hierro giant lizard and La Gomera giant lizard (rediscovered 1974 and 1999, respectively); the somewhat smaller Tenerife speckled lizard was only discovered for the first time in 1996.
At this point, not a single living individual has been captured and any remaining population, if existing, is assumed to be tiny.
Read more about this topic: La Palma Giant Lizard
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