Reptiles and Amphibians

Deep down inside me a tiny voice was calling. At first scarcely audible, it persisted until I could no longer ignore it. It was the voice of the wild places, and I knew that it was now part of me forever.  –Percy Fawcett, Amazon explorer. This is a relatively common species found in the Amazon basin […]

Fillet of a fenny snake, In the caldron boil and bake; Eye of newt, and toe of frog,   Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,  Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting,  Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing,—  For a charm of powerful trouble,  Like a hell-broth boil and bubble. – The three witches, Macbeth.  William Shakespeare. Rough-skinned newts are the most commonly encountered

If I had my way, we’d sleep every night all wrapped around each other like hibernating rattlesnakes.  William S. Burrourghs. Lampropeltis – Greek lampros meaning radiant, and pelta meaning small shields.  Triangulum is derived from the Latin triangulus meaning “having three angles”.  Other common names include chin snake, chicken snake, cow-sucker, milk sucker, and thunder-and-lightening snake.  They are also known as checkered adder for

“He ketched a frog one day, and took him home, and said he cal’lated to educate him; and so he never done nothing for three months but set in his back yard and learn that frog to jump.” Simon Wheeler inThe Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.  Mark Twain. his is North America’s largest frog averaging

This has no digestive organs, and gets no food but from the fire, in which it constantly renews its scaly skin. The salamander, which renews its scaly skin in the fire,—for virtue —Leonardo da Vinci This is a common California salamander with a wide distribution that extends along the coast from Baja California through southern CA