Floyd and I went hiking through the desert scrub and low-laying foothills West of the White Tank mountains for a few hours this afternoon. Temperatures were in the mid 70’s, and there was a good amount of wind. We saw a lot of the usual whiptails, urosaurus, zebra-tailed lizards, but not much else. We did run across a young Diamondback Rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox) and a Desert Horned Lizard and got a few quick pictures.
We went out tonight and found a good 10 or so snakes in the nice, warm air. The temperatures stayed in the mid 70’s for about an hour and a half after dark, and there was a lot of movement in that time. Here’s some of what we found:
We went for a short hike Easter evening about an hour West of Phoenix and saw lizards of all sorts. I got a few shots that might have had some promise, but am not too bright and left my ISO at 800 from some previous in-home screwing around. Lots of white on my card. Whoops! I did realize it in time, however, to get a couple shots of a cool little Desert Horned Lizard (Phrynosoma platyrhinos).
* Thanks to Jeff Williams from the AHA for the correct ID.
We did a little exploring tonight West of Phoenix and found a new leg to our “close to home” route, as well as a few snakes! Totals:
2 Western Diamondbacks (Crotalus atrox)
3 Mojave Rattlesnakes (Crotalus scutulatus), 2 DOR
2 Sonoran Sidewinders (Crotalus cerastes cercobombus), 1 DOR
… nothing spectaular, but a good turnout for a first night out, down in the low 70’s.
When we found the first atrox, I moved it off the road for some photos. When we got to the side of the road, the bushes to my right also started buzzing with the second atrox of the evening! Obviously we were pretty excited that our first snake of the year ended up having a buddy. We got a few pictures of the first one, and then a few of the second, and left them alone.
#1:
#2:
A pretty, young Mojave Rattlesnake (Crotalus scutulatus) with an X on the tail:
A Very Calm Adult Sonoran Sidewinder (Crotalus cerastes cercobombus):
I’ve got some night-time practice to do with my camera, but otherwise a productive start to the year.
I went shopping last night for some new hiking boots and ended up getting the same pair as I had purchased last year:
They are touted as ‘rattlesnake proof’. I have no idea why, but some herpers view wearing this kind of thing as stupid. I personally don’t see how any extra caution could possibly be laughed at … it isn’t like looking for venomous snakes is like playing checkers and you can afford to ‘lose a couple’. Also nice, they’re CACTUS-proof, waterproof, and one long boot up the calf makes them pretty damn comfortable for driving long distances to my surprise. I absolutely wore out the pair I bought last year, putting a good 50+ miles on them from what I can estimate.
I also bought this hat:
It will make me look stupid, but not as stupid as the constantly sun-burnt ears and nose of last year. It is a welcome trade.
I also got a new maglight. I can’t find my other one, and I solve my problems irresponsibly.
Kelly and I finally got out of the house to try out luck in the low 70’s weather we’ve been having. We’re both still getting over being sick so lazily poking around a local mountain was a great time. We saw a lot of side blotched (Uta stansburian) and Ornate Tree (Urosaurus ornatus) lizards, but no snakes or chucks. Oh well. It was a nice day and we made the most of it by finding a nice place to sit for awhile, and for me to practice a little with some high dynamic range photography on my new camera. I saved them as high-res desktop graphics for wide-format monitors. Download them and check them out.
Regular picture of a regular lizard out looking for a girlfriend (this isn’t the HDR, obivously).
Desert HDR 1 (right-click to save as):
Desert HDR 2 (right-click to save as):
Last night at around 5pm we got the idea to get our sick asses off the couch and maybe see if there’s something crawling on SVP. I didn’t think we’d see much, but hey … maybe. Even if I expect to see absolutely nothing, some time out driving with new music while the sun goes down is time well spent. Hopefully the sickness will end soon and I’ll actually be able to use that fancypants new camera on something out there.
I’m unfortunately stuck at home sick on the first really nice, herp-friendly weekend of the year. That leaves my pets to be the subject of lots and lots of bad photos while I practice with my new toys.
