I found this little guy in the Spring, barely the size of a pencil. I don’t even photograph most of them from the amount that are seen, but this one had a tail pattern turned 90 degrees, resulting in a single black stripe running the length. I hope he lives long enough to see him again one of these days out in that spot.
Kris and I found this diamondback laying in the middle of a dry wash at about 5am one morning, exactly as pictured here. We were really up there looking for blacktails and az black rattlers, but I’m always happy to see an atrox.
We do get colorful leaves in the fall too … just not as many of them. Oh ya, and there’s a big rattlesnake sitting there too.
This is a common look for a young male Mojave rattlesnake out West of Phoenix. Notice the enlargement in the tail, past the cloaca, as a giveaway of the animal’s gender. Males store the hemipenes in the tail area, creating the swell.
This one isn’t technically wild; he was captured by my snake removal service at a home in Phoenix and this is the the wash where he’s released. I don’t usually photograph the releases, but he looked cool on the white rocks, so here he is. Gophersnakes like this are the second most common animal I am called to capture around Phoenix. Western Diamondback Rattlesnakes are the first.
This is one of just a handful of young snakes we found on a hot, dry June evening West of Phoenix. While I don’t normally go looking for these guys in the driest parts of the year, I had a friend in town and it seemed possible to see something … and if you only go out when success is certain, you never learn anything.
While sitting in the bushes for an hour or two watching a Speckled Rattlesnake, I was also being watched.
We found this little dude sitting in a wash where I frequently look for Black-Tailed Rattlesnakes (we found one of those too).
It’s a greater short-horned lizard, Phrynosoma hernandesi.
These guys are hard to catch, and harder to photograph. I managed to sneak up on this one getting some early morning sun and get a photo shots before it disappeared into the brush.
Sonoran Coachwhip, Coluber flagellum cingulum
Coachwhip
I haven’t seen this before! Bright pink tongue coming out of that dark little venom-filled head.
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