#side blotched lizard

[tgirl-tamag0tchi]

I’m gonna make my own version of Omegaverse fic, but instead it’s based on these lizards.

And it’s gonna be t4t polyamorous yuri.

I love you common side-blotched lizard.

[herpsandbirds]

Western Side-blotched Lizard (Uta stansburiana elegans), family Phrynosomatidae, Southern CA, USA

photograph by Andrea Kreuzhage

[rjzimmerman]

Today’s hike: lots of fun with the non-human creatures

I hiked in Tahquitz Canyon today, which is in Palm Springs. Tahquitz is a little secret, but more people are discovering it. Great hike today! Read on to learn why.

Here’s a landscape view of part of the canyon, followed by a photo of a hummingbird hovering over a chuparosa bloom. The red-flowering bush is chuparosa, and they are blooming crazy right now. I think “chuparosa” translated means hummingbird. Hummingbirds love the tubular, sweet red flowers. Actually, I pick and snack on the flowers. They taste like sweet cucumbers.

The waterfall was sort of strong, and Tahquitz Creek was flowing sort of strong. But I’m comparing the falls and the creek to last year, when we had strong winter snows and rains and spring rains. Photos of the waterfall and the creek.

A side blotched lizard posed for me, after I politely asked it to do so. (I actually did that, and when it jumped on top of the granite boulder, as if to pose, I had to laugh.) You can see how well-camouflaged this lizard is relative to the granite that dominates its home.

Then, the bighorn. Three male bighorns decided to come down from the plateau above the canyon, or perhaps leave one of the side canyons. February and March are birthing months, so I wonder whether the girls kicked the boys out of the nursery. An obviously dominant alpha male (large horns), a young adult male, and a teenage boy. You can tell he was a teenager, because he assumed a challenging, in-your-face pose toward me.....as in “who the fuck you looking at?”

Then the snake. A red diamond rattlesnake, a big one, probably 36 to 38 inches long. I was kind of stuck because snake was just off the trail on the left, in a little spot between boulders. If I walked by snake, I would be in his/her striking distance, because these snakes can strike at a distance equal to 1/3 to 1/2 of their body length. As I got closer, snake went into the coiled, striking mode. But lucky me......a ranger was coming up trail, and he saw the situation and persuaded snake to move into a crevice.

All photos by rjzimmerman March 20, 2018.

[tgirl-tamag0tchi]

Blue: Deeply in poetic yearning love with Yellow. Thinks Orange is rude and doesn’t like her, afraid she’ll take away Yellow.

Yellow: Has queer-platonic crushes on Blue and Orange, as they’re her best friends, but also just likes to flirt around with girls.

Orange: Wants to have both Blue and Yellow for herself. Wants them to her girlfriends.

[herpsandbirds]

Got some pictures of this little guy (about 4 inches tip to tip) in Death Valley, CA.

Lizard ID - Death Valley, CA, USA:

Hello, yess, I believe that this is a Common Side-blotched Lizard (Uta stansburiana), family Phrynosomatidae.

Common side-blotched lizard - Wikipedia

[tgirl-tamag0tchi]

So… I did already do an assignment on my favorite species of lizard… but for the bit… I’m gonna do it again for another.

I’m gonna do so many assignments on this one lizard just to fuck with my herpetology professor.

Is this a good bit?

Not really… but I’m gonna do it.

[taysanimaladventures]

What's my icon? It's a hatchling of Uta Stansburiana, the side-blotched lizard. These seemingly ordinary lizards have an an extraordinary mating pattern. Every male has a different color throat that's either yellow (top left), blue (top right) or orange. Each color is associated with a different strategy for finding mates. Orange throats have higher testosterone and are the largest of the morphs. They are bullies and will fight the smaller blue-throated males to get the females. Orange beats blue. Yellow throats are small and sneaky. Their anatomy is comparable to a females, and will simply sneak past the not-so-bright orange males to mate with females. Yellow beats orange. Blue throats, while not the strongest, cooperate together to get females. Together they can stop the advancement of yellow sneakers. Blue beats yellow. Over time, a different color will dominate but none of them will ever die out. It's evolutionary rock-paper-scissors!

[velocithea]

I think more people should think about the common side-blotched lizard. They are a very, very interesting species, particularly when it comes to the males of the species.

(Image credit to deep look)

As pictured above, males come in 3 different colors: blue, orange, and yellow. Each color corresponds to a different mating strategy.

For blue males, they’re monogamous, exclusively guarding over one female.

Orange males meanwhile guard an entire territory of multiple females.

And for the yellow males, being the opportunist color, they don’t hold any territorial influence over any females, instead mating with whatever female they can find.

This has some interesting implications if these lizards were of a society.