a bonanza of lizards

[Dan]

So I was reading the thread about musical inspiration and I was thinking about how for me music is often more about motivation. ; I'd mentioned how I sometimes use a peppy bit of music to motivate me to process through some pictures.

I started playing something (Jonny Grey, by Eifel 65, it's got this fast moving feel that sort of propels me along) and opened up Lightroom, and it went straight to a page that had a bunch of reptile pictures I took a while back. ; That became my theme, and.. well, here we are.

I fear that this mindset is not entirely conducive to independent analysis of my pictures and of how to process them, I get sort of impulsive and use a rather slapdash approach of processing in order to move on to the next image. ; But let's see what I came up with.
Hmm.. I was going to skip expando this time, but I can't seem to get the images to display full res without it. ; I'll put it back in and try to figure out what's going on later.

The first two are from animals that a cousin used to keep, I had the chance to shoot them a while back and had a lot of fun. ; I think this first one is some sort of monitor, but I forgot the specific species. ; It was a very stocky, muscular looking lizard, this shot may make it seem imposing but as I seem to recall it was fairly well mannered.
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/IMG_1847.jpg[/expando]


I believe this next one is a leopard gecko. ; Geckos have some of the neatest eyes in the animal kingdom. ; Both this and the previous shots were taken with the humble kit lens, right in the sweet spot of F8. ; Back in my digital rebel mark one days.
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/IMG_1828.jpg[/expando]

Now we have to jump forwards in time from 2004 to 2007, time has passed and my camera has been upgraded to the 30D, the lenses used are the Tamron 28-75 and the Canon 70-200F4. ; Setting is the Shedd Aquarium, in Chicago, they had a temporary lizard exhibit. ; I believe I've posted pictures from it before, maybe of the star of the attraction, a komodo dragon. ; The komodo was certainly impressive, but frankly I find the other lizards a lot more interesting and just downright cool. ; So it's time to give them some love.

We start off, well.. this thing. ; I think it's another monitor, but I can't for the life of me remember what kind. ; Based on a wikipedia hunt I'd guess it's a crocodile monitor. ; Another quite solidly built monitor, this thing was huge. ; Notice the coloration, I kept thinking that it looked pixelated. ; Apologies if this is a frustrating angle.. I just didn't know how to shoot this beasty, I tend to default to doing headshots if I can't figure out how else to handle them.
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_9822.jpg[/expando]

Next up is another unknown, it might be another monitor, one of the leaner, more arboreal kinds.
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_0111.jpg[/expando]

Who doesn't love a day gecko? ; I certainly don't.. don't not love them... ; Oy that's awkward. ; No idea on the specific species, but I know it's a day gecko, the almost neon green coloration is the tipoff. ; Honestly it's brighter in person than I could manage to recreate here. ; I often worry about going too far with color, but this time I couldn't get it strong enough to match the real thing. ; It's demonstrating what geckos do so well, sticking to just about any surface. ; The explanation of how they do that gets rather interesting, apparently the current thinking is that it may involve the van der Waals force, the forces at work on the molecular level. ; There is research at work to understand this phenomenon and perhaps harness it for human use, the wikipedia article on geckos has a little more info on what is currently known about it.
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Ahh, timing. ; No idea on the species, but isn't the heavy armor look of the scales magnificent? ; And yep, another one with forked tongues.
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_0018.jpg[/expando]

As we come to the end of this little exhibition (at least of my post on it) I must spend some quality time with the chameleons. ; Still no idea of the specific species, I gotta start taking pictures of the name plates so I can record the species for later.
Maybe I am exaggerating their colors. ; I can't help myself. ; But they're such a spectacular group of animals. ; Such a contrast of beautiful and ugly. ; Bright colors, ugly lines, bizarre eyes. ; I'm pretty sure I've posted pictures of this individual before too, but it was years ago and I just can't remember which I used previously.
I'll accept that maybe the DOF is too shallow, but for all of these pictures I was operating at the edges of what was possible in terms of light. ; This was shot at 200mm, F4, 1/100 at ISO 1600. ;
[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_0080.jpg[/expando]

For the last of the collection I'm posting one that might be over processed. ; But I was carried away by the music, what can I say.. I just had to use a heavy handed velvia filter to make this colorful little guy (or girl, no idea on the gender, I think they're often sexually dimorphic (meaning the sexes look different) but since I don't even know the species I can't look it up to see) look even edgier.

[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_0060.jpg[/expando]
I don't expect to get a chance to shoot such as wide and spectacular a variety of lizards as this again for some time. ; The exhibit is long gone with no sign of it returning, that leaves me with a comparatively restricted choice of local zoo animals or else a handful of wild snakes that I might be able to find.

It's frustrating.. but looking ahead to this year I'm on a mission to focus on my favored zoo mammals for this year's photo contest. ; There's been some really good entries in the past few years, the winner last year was an edgy B&W shot of a giraffe with a baby giraffe. ; I just can't do that kind of style, it's not my way, but this year it's time to get serious. ; Eye of the tiger and all that.. while I'm shooting tigers.. and all that.

edited to re-expando all the pictures

 

[ELinder]

Very cool. I love the eyes on the first 2, and the skin texture on all of them is very interesting. We see a lot of the small lizards here in FL, especially inside pool lanais, most likely to get away from predators. I just wish they'd stay outside. The little rascals are FAST, and once in the house, I'm more than likely to find them a few months later under the sofa, dried up like an Egyptian mummy.

Erich

 

[hulagirl]

My name is Johnny Grey,
wont you play with me.



Perfect song for processing lizard photos! ; I like the second to last photo. ; He looks like a little old man come to check you out and then shoo you away!

 

[Dan]

Yeah, Erich, I know you Floridians get a lot more lizards to play with than us midwesterners do. ; I actually saw my first Florida gecko last year. ; I was so stupidly excited... ; I honestly didn't know that Florida had geckos, I saw it on the wall of the outside of the Crystal Palace and I was just giddy, all hurrying to get my camera out so that I could perhaps get a bad low light picture of it before I had to go inside for dinner.

You have to understand.. I know that geckos are known for hanging out on walls, that some people intentionally try to get them to live inside their houses to feast on local insects. ; But I'd never seen it, this was my first proper wall gecko.

Someone who saw my getting all excited over seeing it told me that yes, Floridians have plenty of geckos. ; I gather he was amused at how excited I was over it. ; Hehe, I'm happy to provide amusement.


Mind you.. ; I'm still happy to live where I do. ; You know why? ; We have almost nothing here THAT CAN KILL ME. ; I'm sure those of you that live with those animals have come to terms with this, well I haven't. ; I've only recently found out that we have any possibly venomous snakes at all living up at my latitude, but they're largely confined to specific areas. ; Last year after my Disney trip I went on a jaunt out to the coast and I vividly remember stopping off at a rest stop on the way and seeing a sign warning of the potentially deadly snakes that live in the region. ; That was kind of freaky.

You don't see signs like that where I live. ; I spend plenty of time complaining about how flat it is here (not that Florida is different, but I spent a fraction of my childhood in Colorado so Illinois is always held up to that as a comparison) but at least I don't have to be on alert for deadly snakes. ; It appears we do have some, and I may yet come into contact with them (and if I do I'm getting a picture of it), but.. by and large the wildlife out here is placed firmly in the pest category, rather than the "it could kill you if you're not careful" group. ; Frankly the most dangerous thing I'm likely to encounter is a tick infected with lyme disease or maybe a mosquito with West Nile Virus.

I wish we had iguanas running free in the wild, though. ; Oh, I know they're a pest, I appreciate the problems that can be caused by a non native species.. but I LIKE iguanas. ; I find them charming, in a grumpy, quirky sort of way. ; Yeah, the big ones get big enough to be able to hurt you just by whipping you with their tails.. but they also get such spectacular coloring. ; And they're not predators. ; Frankly anything that big and bad looking that isn't looking at you figuring out if you're good to eat is a good thing in my book. ; I'm sure they're still willing to view you as a threat, but I'd prefer threat to food any day.

 

[zackiedawg]

Nice reptiles! ; I'm a lizard fan, and of course being a Floridian, have quite a few around, and often in, my house.

Your last two are definitely chameleons of some form - I'd recognize those googly eyes anywhere! ; I love chameleons myself...grumpy adorable things.

We have TONS of geckos - mostly the common house gecko variety (gummies, as they are often nicknamed down here for their semi-transparent, sticky look), and those are the ones most often found indoors. ; We don't let them in, but they get in anyway - mommas like to put their eggs in warm cracks and crevasses, so window sills are very popular...the itty-bitty young wiggle straight into the house with no problem, and you end up with wee little geckos randomly showing up on an inside wall above the TV, or stuck on the ceiling in the kitchen.

We also have lots and lots of anoles - mostly the brown kind, lesser of the native green ones (which are killed off by the brown), and the much larger and imposing knight anole, which approach small iguana size. ; Oh, and speaking of iguanas (which I also love!)...we are polluted with the green iguanas! ; Though the coldest winter on record definitely put a dent in their population (when temps fall below 40 here, they actually have to post warnings with the weather forecast on the news that the temps will be in the 40s, with chance of falling iguanas. ; Seriously! ; They go rigid and catatonic, and tend to release their grips in a coma-like state, which results in falling out of trees and off roofs. ; In the morning, they're all over the sidewalks and in front lawns, on their backs and comatose. ; If the cold lasts too long, many die (and did). ; But they're not all gone...still had one in my yard this morning. ; We have skinks of all variety, we have salamanders, we have northern curly-taileds, we have monitors, we have basilisk lizards (the famous 'Jesus' lizard that runs across water)...and I'm quite sure many more that I haven't seen around the house yet.

I wouldn't mind more of the big guys - I always get a little thrill when I come across a 4-6 foot iguana lounging in my yard...It makes me feel like I'm living somewhere exotic and interesting, rather than the suburbs! ; I would love to come across a nice 5 foot monitor, maybe a goanna or two, throw in some spiny-tails...but you can keep the komodos in the zoos, thank you very much!

 

[Dan]

Dude.. seriously, you have JESUS LIZARDS?

That was my one disappointment from that lizard exhibition. ; The species list said they'd have basilisk lizards, but that particular species was absent. ; Just an empty cage. ; I was so looking forward to getting a shot of that one. ; I've had a chance to shoot one of those before, but I wanted another one. ; Oh well.

I've heard of the danger of falling iguanas. ; I heard a story of some well meaning woman who found a catatonic iguana and took it inside because she was worried about its health. ; I love that. ; I mean.. I love the idea that there are people out there who'd find a dormant iguana and worry about it and actually take it inside their homes. ; I'm so used to the "eww, lizards" reaction that the idea of someone reacting like that warms my heart.

Anyway, the story ends predictably.. the iguana warmed up, woke up, and freaked out. ; That was probably not a good scene.

Honestly I'm sad to hear of iguanas dying.. but I can accept that they're an invasive species and that it's probably a useful thing to have less of them lounging about.

I'm still surprised to hear of the variety of lizards that you've got running amuck down there. ; I assume that most of those are invasive? ; So far as I know none of those should be there except the green anoles. ; I've also heard tales of pythons growing enormous and ending up in local swamps and such. ; Snakes I don't deal with as well.. stories like that make me quite happy to be living up here. ; The only snakes I've encountered up here were terrified of me, and I'm happy leaving it at that. ; Because I don't want them to realize how scared I was of them.

Okay, time for a little bonus lizard action. ; So I didn't get basilisk lizards.. but I did this a shot of this freaky little fellow:

[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/_MG_9930.jpg[/expando]

I think that's a frilled lizard. ; At rest it has an interesting quality to it, but those of you who haven't seen one in action owe it to yourselves to google frilled lizards and to try to find a video of one when it's aggravated. ; They are so funny when they get up on two legs.

I'm not certain that's what that is, though.. the videos show an animal that folds its frills up into a neat and tidy package, rather than apparently leaving them loose like this fellow did. ; So maybe I've misidentified it.

Also, speaking of knight anoles..

[expando]http://i289.photobucket.com/albums/ll239/NomadSoul76/lizards/IMG_1849.jpg[/expando]

I believe that's one, but again I'm working from memory from many years ago, I can't be sure. ; This is another one from the earlier episode, not from the aquarium exhibit. ; I liked the way it appeared to be expressing its displeasure at being handled. ; Perhaps it's relevant to mention that I've heard that these guys bite hard. ; Yeah, I wouldn't have been the one handling it.

I did handle one of these lizards. ; The adorable crested gecko.

[expando]http://images.fotopic.net/ylnc9d.jpg[/expando]

I know I've posted that pic before, but I'm repeating it. ; While I was taking that shot it jumped onto my camera. ; Amazingly it left no marks on the lens, this thing has to be one of the cleanest animals I've ever dealt with.

It was a really neat critter. ; It was completely okay with being handled, and it was kind of soft to the touch. ; It was like this cuddly little teddy bear of a lizard. ; It stuck to you with gecko feet, rather than the prickly iguana feet that I'd experienced before (it didn't hurt, but dang but those claws dug into my skin and made it hard to peel that fellow off of me). ; You don't deal with one if you're uncertain about lizards, you could end up with it on your head with little to no warning, but.. it was a very peasant lizard to deal with.

BTW, the iguana was a lot of fun too. ; It was a younger, smaller animal. ; It was tame, and used to being handled. ; It liked being on me, I gather it enjoyed the warmth I provided. ; It really did not want to go back into its cage, and that's where the trouble started. ; The claws didn't hurt.. unless you were trying to remove it when it didn't want to go. ; I'd try to remove it with my other hand and it'd end up stuck to that hand. ; After juggling it for a while I finally managed to remove it and get it stashed away in its cage.

This was back in high school.. I have a story about that. ; That was from the "companion animal biology" class. ; Apparently some time in the past they had a snake get loose and didn't see it for quite a while. ; Eventually they found it again, after it had spent a long time living in the ducts eating mice.

So again, I appreciate that iguanas are invasive.. but.. darnit, I just love the idea of going out in the morning and seeing comatose iguanas littering the neighborhood. ; That image just amuses the heck out of me. ; The weirdest thing I ever saw was one morning when I found my garage door covered in tiny snails. ; Seriously.. I don't know why they were there, but they seemed to stay there, I ended up with hundreds of tiny dead snails stuck to my garage door. ; It was WEIRD. ; It wasn't really a mess, they were so small that they amounted to very little.

Maybe it's for the best.. I'd probably end up doing something silly like gathering a bunch of iguanas in a row and putting tiny little mexican hats on them and trying to set up some sort of a posed scene. ; The tale of the iguana kid, or something like that.

 

[zackiedawg]

Dude.. seriously, you have JESUS LIZARDS?

Indeed we do. ; I've not yet photographed one, but I've seen them. ; There are actually more down where I work than where I live...Dade and Broward counties have had them for a while, they are just working their way into Palm Beach county the past decade or so. ; I love these guys!

I've heard of the danger of falling iguanas. ; I heard a story of some well meaning woman who found a catatonic iguana and took it inside because she was worried about its health. ; Honestly I'm sad to hear of iguanas dying.. but I can accept that they're an invasive species and that it's probably a useful thing to have less of them lounging about.

I've moved them to safer places myself. ; Last month when we had a huge cold spell, there were dozens of them on the sidewalks and a few in the street around my neighborhood. ; I was out for a walk and moved the ones I came across out into the fields or on the sides of people's houses so hopefully when it warmed up they'd be in a safe spot. ; People will go around stepping on them, running them over with their car, etc when they find them on the ground. ; While I understand how invasive they are and how they are killing off other species in their population dominance and appetite as they compete for food, I can't ever abide by non-humane methods of culling population and won't partake of it myself. ; There's the side of me that says, even if they are killing off other species, that if they're here and can out-survive other species in the area, then so be it - that's how nature works, even when man intervenes and spreads non-native species. ; My favorite 'portrait' of an iguana in my backyard...a younger one in vibrant green that let me get right close to him:

I'm still surprised to hear of the variety of lizards that you've got running amuck down there. ; I assume that most of those are invasive? ; So far as I know none of those should be there except the green anoles. ; I've also heard tales of pythons growing enormous and ending up in local swamps and such. ; Snakes I don't deal with as well.. stories like that make me quite happy to be living up here. ; The only snakes I've encountered up here were terrified of me, and I'm happy leaving it at that. ; Because I don't want them to realize how scared I was of them.

I actually love snakes too. ; I really love all animals...everything except a few types of bugs which I'm not at all fond of...otherwise bring on any animal from the smallest rodent to the biggest mammal and I'd love to see them! ; We do have an enormous non-native population, both fauna and flora. ; Florida possibly has the worst problem of any state in the US, at least by sheer number of invasive species (though I hear Hawaii has it bad too). ; While some states are dealing with much more destructive native species, for sheer variety and volume, Florida is hard to beat. ; Florida Fisha nd Game has a running list of documented invaders...check out this link:

http://myfwc.com/WILDLIFEHABITATS/Nonnative_index.htm

Click on the type for the list of known species.

frilled lizard

Boy would I love to have frilleds around here! ; I don't think that one made it here. ; yet.

Also, speaking of knight anoles..

Yep...looks like a yougn knight anole alright. ; They don't bite too bad when small, but when they get to be a foot or so long, they can definitely lay down a painful clamp! ; (not severe pain, and usually causes small skin abrasions or punctures since they have such tiny teeth - but their teeth are sharp unlike the sandy grit brown anoles call teeth; the pressure of their bite is a bit surprising the first time they get you, especially if you always ran around as a kid letting anoles bite your earlobes to wear as earrings and scare the girls in school). ; Here's a full-grown knight anole on the fence in my backyard:

BTW, the iguana was a lot of fun too. ; It was a younger, smaller animal. ; It was tame, and used to being handled. ; It liked being on me, I gather it enjoyed the warmth I provided. ; It really did not want to go back into its cage, and that's where the trouble started.

Even the wild ones will eventually relent when you hold them a bit - they eventually stop wriggling and whipping their tail, and fall into a peaceful acquiescence on your arm, especially when you gently stroke their head with your thumb, or turn them on their belly and rub between the front legs. ; They'll try to bite when you grab them, but purely defensively, and will whip that tail around like a weapon, which needs to be paid attention to with the adults who have quite the row of godzilla spikes running down their back and tail. ; But they're otherwise pretty tame and tolerant of people nearby, and don't really bother anyone except in their fondness for flowers, and deficating on decks.

So again, I appreciate that iguanas are invasive.. but.. darnit, I just love the idea of going out in the morning and seeing comatose iguanas littering the neighborhood. ; That image just amuses the heck out of me.

I've been living here decades, and it still never gets old for me. ; I prefer them not comatose, just lounging on my deck by the pool, or sitting atop my patio table when I head out for a swim...especially when guests are over who haven't ever seen a 4-6 foot lizard in the wild before, and are either amazed and gap-mouthed, or scared out of their wits! ; I feel sorry for them when they're comatose in the cold. ; I know most of the time they'll snap right back when it warms up, but it just looks so sad and hopeless when they're just lying there upside down and stiff.

Maybe it's for the best.. I'd probably end up doing something silly like gathering a bunch of iguanas in a row and putting tiny little mexican hats on them and trying to set up some sort of a posed scene. ; The tale of the iguana kid, or something like that.

You could have done that this past couple of months! ; Usually our under-40 cold only lasts a few hours, so you don't have much time to gather them up...but we had some unusual cold that went throughout the day and for several days on end, and the iguanas stayed catatonic for most of the day (and unfortunately, that's also when some died). ; The other lizards are none too happy either...but the anoles just hunker down in the trees, and the geckos squeeze up against windows and doors of houses where the warmth leaks out. ; The iguanas can't handle it as well with their large size. ; The knight anoles didn't do too well either - some estimates are that as much as 40% of the iguana population and 1/3 of the knight anole population died off this January. ; That still leaves a ton of iguanas, but set their population explosion back a decade or so.

I know Dade and Broward have some Nile Monitors...that's another species starting to make a foothold down here. ; Haven't seen one yet, though they are rumored to be spotted all the time in the city where I work. ; I do NOT want to be bit by one of these, but would love to see one in the wild. ; Nile monitors apparently go into brumation in the cold weather, essentially like bear hibernation where they can 'sleep' for 2-3 months without eating. ; I don't know how they fared during our cold snap.

 

[Dan]

I'm starting to think I need to go on safari in Florida.

That iguana picture is just spectacular. ; They're such amazing looking animals. ; I'll continue my wildlife photography attempts around here.. but I will never, ever, get a picture of anything that amazing looking.

So I looked into that invasive species list. ; You (in the sense of Florida in general, I get the idea that some of these are still regional) have got CAPYBARAS! ; This just gets better and better. ; Oooh.. and escaped laboratory monkeys. ; That never sounds good.

I was getting bummed looking at my reptile pictures, thinking how to even get another shot at that kind of a variety of lizards in captivity won't be too easy. ; I'd have to go on a hunt through area zoos to try to find one with a heavy reptile count. ; And in the wild, well.. I was thinking I'd just have to forget about it. ; They're from fairly exotic ports of call that I'm likely never to go to.

Then I look through this list. ; There's a chameleon species in there. ; Also two of my favored geckos, a day gecko and the tokay gecko.

Feh.. all Illinois has in the way of invasive animals are some beetles, the ever popular zebra mussel, and the asian carp that are causing such concern as they make their way towards Lake Michigan where they could potentially wipe out the fishery and destroy the fishing industry here.

Oh yeah, and a population of parakeets in Chicago. ; So at least that's fun.

 

[Roger]

This thread is beginning to remind me of my own experience:

(and Kiki would love this!)

http://amazornia.us/home.html

The Wild Parrots of the OC. ; My *only* encounter with them was a day I was working, and they took temporary refuge in one of the parking lot's trees. ; It got louder and louder as they then proceeded to "trim" the tree, culminating with one flying into my office window at a high rate of speed while I was on the phone. ; It was loud enough for the person on the phone to hear.....and it left a mark on the window too.[nb]Outline, including the wing....[/nb] ; But it didn't seem to be badly injured as it wasn't in the fall zone.......

 

[zackiedawg]

Oh boy...we got parrots. ; All around here. ; Sitting on the power pole on the corner of my street usually, making a racket.

Yeah, we have monkeys...several variety in fact. ; There's a well known spot called Ann Kolb Nature Center just south of Ft. Lauderdale where the monkeys have been living for decades...a hotel that abuts the park usually has visitors in the parking lot to see the monkeys who of course come to the fence for free handouts. ; Then there are the crazy monkeys bouncing around Coconut Grove.

We have crazy invasive species down here. ; The pythons definitely are causing worry, because they are really taking off in population and are battling the gators for alpha dominance in the Everglades. ; So far, it's been a draw - they've each notched kills on eachother.

I haven't seen capybaras yet, but can't wait to someday. ; I was well versed in their cousins, the nutria, from going to college in New Orleans where they have long since become a pest. ; And of course I'm always on the hunt to photograph some of our native species too - like bobcats, panthers, and bears...haven't had any luck with those so far.

 

[zackiedawg]

Dan, remember when I said we have Jesus lizards?

Well, funny thing - I had mentioned that I hadn't really managed a shot of one, and then I'm out shooting this weekend and what do I see hiding in the trees above the water...

[attachimg=1]

Sure enough...a young brown basilisk lizard! ; JC lizard himself. ; I wish I had gotten a shot of him running across the water, but he was far enough away and tucked into the shadows, so he wasn't very worried about me and not prone to moving. ; He's young, as he hasn't lost his little back pattern yet or developed his head ridge much. ; He was probably 10-12 inches or so, head to tip of tail. ; Check out those big back legs - a sure giveaway of the basilisk (along with the head ridge as they get older).

Just thought you might want to see - and wasn't worth starting it's own thread for!

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