A Great Basin Rattlesnake from northern Arizona, showing off its sharply patterned face. These are a wide-spread rattlesnake species, found throughout the Great Basin Desert in the western US, and some transitional habitat with influence from Mohave and Sonoran deserts, and high-elevation pine forest. Personally, I think the rosy-cheeked variety often seen in the Arizona Strip are uniquely beautiful. This one was photographed and left alone to continue doing its rattlesnakey things.
A dull Arizona Ridgenosed Rattlesnake found out at night in madrean oak forest of southeastern Arizona. Nocturnal activity is common with this species during the humid, hot nights of monsoon season.
A young Blacktailed Rattlesnake moving up from the rock wall where it lives to catch morning sun in southeastern Arizona. Structures like this provide a range of options, allowing the snake to very precisely control its temperature – warming when it needs to, and retreating to shade as the day gets hot.
A Grand Canyon Rattlesnake from the northernmost part of Arizona.
A Nose Horned Viper we found in Greece a few years ago.
Each year during the monsoon, these amazing little frogs show up. They’re often mistaken for poisonous toads due to their superficial similarity and typically green color. It’s a Couch’s Spadefoot, a small and harmless species that spends much of its time underground. Its name is literal: to help with the underground lifestyle, it has hard protrusions on each hind leg to help dig in.
They also have, unlike most amphibians, cat-eyes (this one has them wide open, however). If you see one, you can ignore it as it’s not at all dangerous, but still keep your dog from eating it.
A Speckled Rattlesnake from the Belmont Mountains, west of Phoenix. These rattlesnakes in this range often lack much of the characteristic speckling within the eye, leaving solid-colored, light grey or pale white eyes. A typical response when we post a snake from this area is something like “it’s ready to shed skin”, though that is not at all the case.
A Gila Monster takes a morning stroll through springtime ground cover in 2024. The dry conditions this year have resulted in less green on the ground, increasing surface temperatures and making the desert with even less surface moisture than before. This will be a challenging year for many animals. Fingers crossed for a decent monsoon.
Just before sunset, we found a Great Basin Rattlesnake crossing a road in northeastern Arizona. It was bothered for a few minutes while we took some photos.
A Southwestern Speckled Rattlesnake looking just like a chunk of granite, fallen off the overhead outcrop. As the sun gets lower in the sky, a variety of rodents, birds, and lizards do what they do in surrounding bushes and rocks, oblivious to the invisible predator. To hikers on the mountain, they’re often just as cryptic, remaining hidden as hundreds of feet pass by every Saturday on popular trails.
