While traditional pet stores are often not the best place to buy quality reptiles, a reptile specialty store is a great place to buy a pet snake or lizard. Throughout southern California, there are several different retail establishments that are great places for new keepers, experienced hobbyists, and expert breeders to find healthy reptiles.
All reviews based on my visits to each store and are my own opinions.
Prehistoric Pets (Fountain Valley and Chino)
Prehistoric Pets is internationally known producer of large constrictors. These are great stores to see truly giant snakes and monitor lizards and are often filled on weekends by people looking for a “free zoo” atmosphere. Employees are often busy, though they are willing to help those who are looking to purchase a reptile. Their prices tend to be quite high, especially in species such as ball pythons and boa constrictors that are traditionally very inexpensive.
Amazon Reptile Center (Montclair and Covina)
Amazon Reptile Center is filled with employees that are willing to take the time to discuss reptiles, recommend pets, and bring snakes and lizards out of their cages to show to those that are interested. Despite the wonderful quality of animals, prices are incredibly low, on both animals and supplies. This is a fantastic store to go to find a first reptile. They also have some more exotic and genetically varied specimens in the back which they are ready and wiling to show to those keepers who are looking for something unique.
Radical Reptiles (Stanton)
Radical Reptiles is a good store for the intermediate keeper. With their frequent sales, this is a good place to find a deal on supplies and enclosures for reptiles. They tend to have a more varied selection of small lizards and frogs than most stores. The employees are friendly and have good advice for solving husbandry problems, but the store is often busy, making it important for customers to seek out help themselves.
Reptile Island (Yorba Linda)
Reptile Island is a small shop with a large number of colubrids, many of the more common constrictors, and small lizards. Prices here are average and there are only one or two employees working at a time, but they are knowledgeable and willing to discuss the keeping of reptiles, especially on weekdays when they are the least busy.
LLL Reptile (Oceanside and Escondido)
LLL is packed with every supply a person would need when keeping reptiles, including frozen rodents in small quantities. There are a lot of reptiles in the store, especially larger varieties of constrictors, but employees are generally busy in the back and can be hard to track down to ask questions.
Pet Kingdom (San Diego)
Pet Kingdom has the widest variety of constrictors, monitors, and especially turtles. Their prices are reasonable, though not cheap, but their employees are willing to devote large amounts of time to helping customers and discussing reptiles. They also carry supplies, including a special monitor and tegu diet developed by and available only in the store.
