Mexican Roommate

12/23/2007 @ 3:48:24 PM MST
This Mexican spinytail iguana (Ctenosaura pectinata) greeted me outside my room upon arrival at the villa where I'm staying in Sayulita, Nayarit, Mexico. I decided not to catch it as I didn't want to break its tail.

Recent Rescues

07/27/2007 @ 10:05:08 AM MDT
Today I caught a terrestrial garter snake (Thamnophis elegans) that had eluded two other rescuers, as well as myself yesterday morning. I hate that "almost got it" feeling after missing a good capture. The snake had taken up residence in a Santa Fe resident's koi pond. It came out to sun itself on the same spot every morning it was sunny. I had to belly crawl up to it and reach over a depression in the rock wall along the pond. The resident was quite pleased I was able to get the little bugger, which I released downstream of the sewage treatment plant along the Santa Fe river. Note the wound near the snake's neck, which could have been caused by a cat, raptor or perhaps a close call with an automobile.


07/16/2007 @ 9:57:40 AM MDT
Last week, rescue volunteer Christian called me to accompany him on a rattlesnake rescue. The snake was conveniently waiting for us at a home south of the Eldorado residential development southeast of Santa Fe.


07/16/2007 @ 9:59:33 AM MDT
Christian moved the decent-sized prairie rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis) into his box and we released it in a sparsely populated area between Galisteo and Cerritos, NM, under a scrub oak bush.


07/16/2007 @ 10:56:57 AM MDT


07/16/2007 @ 10:57:13 AM MDT

Baby Texan

A baby western diamondback rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox) found on the road near Woodson, Texas, after a day of intense storm chasing.

Wildlife Center Open House

On Saturday, May 12, the Wildlife Center held an open house. I spent the day hanging with CJ Carmen as he demoed snakes for the folks who visited. Here he holds a snappy great plains skink (Eumeces obsoletus), a common yet not commonly seen lizard in northern New Mexico.


CJ's portable herpto-menangerie.


A striped whipsnake (Masticophis taeniatus), the less common local cousin to the widespread coachwhip snake.


CJ pulls a prairie rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis) out of its box.


Visitors get up close to a western diamondback rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox).


A close up of the western diamondback.

Coffee Cup Crasher

This prairie lizard (Sceloporus undulatus) was found lounging in this coffee cup in my sink. I have no idea how it got there. It's the second one this year, the first got stuck in a dog bowl.

Plains Box Turtles and a Gopher Snake

I was recently storm chasing in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, where I saved four box turtles crossing the highways I was on. This one is an ornate box turtle (Terrapene ornata). He had shut himself down in the middle of the road after a close call with a car tire going 65. He was in a puddle of his own urine, a common box turtle defense when alarmed.


I found this gopher snake (Pituophis catenifer) on the side of a farm road in Greensburg, Kansas, about 2 hours before an almost 2-mile-wide EF-5 tornado struck. He probably did not survive if he didn't get himself down a hole, as pretty much everything above ground was scoured from the face of the Earth by the monster wedge tornado.