Lizard on the Wall

Your Monday Photo Shoot: Your neighborhood is full of wildlife no matter where you live. Catch some of it -- in a picture. - J.S. 

That used to be true for us, a long time ago.  Back on Grannen Road in the late 1980s, our back yard visitors included coyotes, Couch's Spadefoot Toads, Colorado River Toads, Harris's Antelope Squirrels, jackrabbits, desert cottontails, the occasional snake, tortoise or gila monster, and over 50 species of birds.  But that was at the edge of town, outside the city limit, in the foothills of the Tucson Mountains. 


Here in town, in this 1958 housing tract, we get mockingbirds, grackles, mourning doves, lizards, the occasional gecko, spiders and bugs...and that's pretty much it.  But for you, John Scalzi, I went out and looked, again. 

 
At first I saw nothing but mourning doves, but then I noticed that the edge of Tuffy's wading pool had been smashed by a fallen ladder.  When I lifted the ladder, I scared this little guy.

 
He's about twice the size of the one that was in my bathtub last week.  He ran a short distance along the wall, but mostly he just stayed still, and hoped I would go away. 



Eventually I did, but not before getting these pictures.  I took a lot of them, because I liked the angles of the bricks, and frankly, when it comes to wildlife in our yard tonight, he was pretty much IT. 



Karen
 
P.S.  It's raining! Monsoon, here we come!