My experiences this
summer were going to have to be big in order to top living in the
Everglades and working with alligators again, like I had done the
previous year. So I thought about it for a long time and thought
about all the reptiles and amphibians I had never seen before and
obviously decided on the southwest. For over eight months or so
before the trip I
decided that I would be traveling out west again but this time around
I would be aiming for Arizona and the southwest instead of the
northwest like all the previous years. Although I had been to
the southwest before while traveling with my mother and father, I had
never gotten close to traveling my style and getting to spend the
whole time catching a lot of herps. After I finally decided to
do it, the trip excited me the more I thought about seeing and
photographing the animals in the area. There were a couple of
options that I had for going down to the southwest but in the end I
figured that my most productive and fun summer trip would have to be a
two week road cruise with my good buddy David Kahrs. Together we
planned out this large trip and prepared for a strenuous but
productive journey. Although we had never traveled together
before, we both knew that it would work out and we would get to do a
lot.
Our
expedition took us to southern New Mexico, Arizona, California and
nearly into
Mexico to catch and photograph reptiles and amphibians, collect
insects, and watch for birds in these desert habitats. This trip
took place on July 31st and lasted a little over two weeks. We
both shot a lot of film and took some very memorable images. We
also video taped much of our excursion, which was a change for me.
I hadn't gotten into documenting my journeys through video in a long
time, since summer 2000 when I realized that I pretty much sucked at
it, so it was really fun to start over again. These are some of
the photos that I took on the trip.
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Of
course like always, none of the specimens captured were harmed in
any way. We neither keep the animals we photograph nor put
them in coolers to make them more easy to handle and photograph!!!
Had
we kept them and sold the herps that we caught we probably could
have paid back for our trip 5 fold.
However,
people that truly love herpetology don't do that.
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Herp List |
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Bird List |
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The two links above are to lists of the
herps and birds that we saw on our trip. Although David was
looking for all sorts of insects, there were three scarabs that we
were trying to find more than any other in Arizona and we found all
three species: Chrysina beyeri, Chrysina gloriosa, and
Chrysina lecontei. They are very beautiful beetles and related
to some of the beautiful tropical species in Central America.
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Tarantula |
Arizona Coral
snake (Micruroides e. euryxanthus) |
Couch's
Spadefoot (Scaphiopus couchii) |
Black-tailed
rattlesnake |
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On this trip, David and I also collected quite a few insects.
David Kahrs is studying to be an entomologist, as well as overall naturalist, and has a spectacular
insect collection as well as an incredible eye for insect
photography. I too enjoy insects and found it very fun to
collect and learn with him on many nights. Although I like
reading up on insects and faired well in a very difficult college
course of entomology, David's overly vast knowledge on insects makes
me look like I had never stepped in the classroom. David has a broad interest and knowledge in biology which has allowed him to do research on insects, herps, and birds. |
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Insect lights
and sheet
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David taking a
photo of the gloriosa. One actually flew away while he
was photographing it, haha.
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My photo of
(Chrysina gloriosa)
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My photo of
(Chrysina beyeri)
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Sinoloan
Narrowmouth Toad (Gastrophyrne olivacea mazatlanensis) |
Some Arizona
landscape |
Mountain Skink
(Eumeces callicephalus) |
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A good portion of the reptiles and amphibians that we caught
and photographed on this trip were at night so the flashes and
lights made some of the herps difficult to photograph. If
you'll notice all of the rattlesnakes were photographed at night
except the twin-spotted. Certainly a good learning
experience on photography for me. |
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Sonoran Striped whipsnake
(Masticophis b. bilineatus) |
Tuscon Banded
Gecko
(Coleonyx variegatus bogerti) |
Spotted Night
snake
(Hypsiglena torquata ochrorhyncha)
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"Red racer"
actually a red coachwhip
(Masticophis flagellum piceus)
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Cacti in
southern Arizona. This was a beautiful habitat and there
were a lot of reptiles as well as quite a few birds. Above
you can see I combined two photos. Both photos had the same exposure
and were taken at practically the same time, so I don't know what
my film's problem was. |
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Southern California |
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Southern
California's Imperial Sand Dunes |
Desert Iguana
(Dipsosaurus dorsalis) |
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Desert
Tortoise - (Gopherus agassizii)
This guy was so cool.
Now I only have the Texas tortoise (Gopherus berlandieri)
left to catch and photograph in the U.S. and then the Bolson
tortoise (Gopherus flavomarginatus) in Mexico.
Back to Southern Arizona |
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Western
Black-necked Gartersnake (Thamnophis c. cyrtopsis) |
Mountain Spiny
Lizard (Sceloporus jarrovii) |
Ornate Tree
Lizard (Urosaurus ornatus schotti) |
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Tiger
rattlesnake - (Crotalus tigris)
This snake seemed a little
high strung when we caught him. We caught 5 rattlesnakes
that night and they all seemed that way. Each of the 5
snakes were trying nothing more than getting away from us and
weren't very easy to be handled. Since I have only caught 1
of this species I can't really give an estimation on their
attitude but this particular one was a little tough to
handle. I blame some of this on the fact that it was small
too because I don't like dealing with small venomous snakes since
they are easier to make a mistake with.
Notice the small head to body ratio of this snake.
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Western
Diamondback rattlesnake - (Crotalus atrox)
This snakes is
undeserving of its reputation. We caught three w.diamonds
that were three and a half feet or slightly longer and they were
not nearly as aggressive as they could have been.
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Northern
Black-tailed rattlesnake - (Crotalus m. molossus)
We caught
quite a few of these in southern Arizona and I found them one of
the least aggressive species.
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Arizona
Mountain Kingsnake (Lampropeltis
p. pyromelena) |
Big Bend Patchnose snake
(Salvadora deserticola) |
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Sonoran Gopher snake -
(Pituophis catenifer affinis) Got this beauty with the Mexican
border behind me.
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Mojave
rattlesnake - (Crotalus s. scutulatus)
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Western
Twin-spotted rattlesnake - (Crotalus p. pricei)
The
twin-spotted rattlesnake was one of my greatest finds ever. I
loved this little guy and found him very easy going.
The twin-spotted rattlesnakes feed almost
exclusively on Sceloporus species of lizards, such as the
Mountain spiny lizard (Sceloporus jarrovi) aka Yarrow’s spiny
lizard. They are also known to feed on small rodents and baby
yellow-eyed juncos.
They
are a mountain species and in the U.S. can only be found in a few
remote areas of southern Arizona.
Their venom is not known very well or studied
and a disagreement to how toxic their venom still occurs between
herpetologists. Regardless, of the above information there are
several documented accounts where people have gotten bit by this
species and the symptoms, both local and systemic, were more serious
than expected from such a small rattlesnake.
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