Category Archives: Critters

How can I hate his furry, mangy, potentially rabid little butt when he’s this cute?

It was hot in the sun, but nice in the shade.

So the sidewalk was juuuuuust right for his tummy.

He was digesting and relaxing, haven eaten his fill of the birdseed that was supposed to be for the birds!

He might have just been too full to run away. His daily birdseed theft is one of the reasons for my hatred. But then he’s so cute…

I hope I don’t get bubonic plague from him.

I had thought that the new lizards generally hatched in early spring, like late April to early May. That’s when I’ve seen some of the smaller ones last year and this. But today when bringing in the trash barrels I spooked one who’s itsy-bitsy and teeny-tiny and can’t be that old, but he’s late if he’s just hatched. Whatever. He skittered, I froze, he froze, I very, very, very slowly and carefully pulled out my phone and thumbed it on, and he was nice enough to sit still for four quick pictures, leaning down a bit on each one. The he said, “Hit it, Chewie!” and jumped to light speed into the bushes.

Can you see him?

He probably isn’t more than two inches long at most. I think he was sunning himself on or under that black plastic debris that blew in today. Maybe I’ll leave it there for now. It’s a tough universe out there – we all can use a little help.

If you’ve been following this drivel for any length of time, you’ll remember that at our old house we had some raccoons that were regular neighbors. (Actually, “tenants” might be a better term than “neighbors” since they lived up on our roof and in our trees.) The most famous incident (and best pictures) came from the great Racoon Rescue episode, but we had then around pretty much constantly., sometimes in some not quite safe-for-work situations, which in turn led to encounters with up to five curious and trouble-making kits.

Then we moved about a mile away, but at the top of a hill.

Since we’ve been here I’ve seen pairs of raccoons in the early evening around sundown sometimes, but always at the bottom of the hill. Never up here.

Until last night.

As I had folded up the camera tripod after photographing the ISS pass, I took a couple steps toward the front door and noticed that the bushes next to the door were rustling and moving about. I thought it was a cat at first (we have feral cats we see once in a while, often with a writhing lizard in its mouth) but if a feline this would have been a bobcat, not a house cat. Nope, not a cat. Instead, out wandered a raccoon that was almost as big as a mid-sized dog. He/she was ignoring me but headed over to the flower beds (I should have been wondering why those were being dug up) but freaked a bit when I pulled out my camera and grabbed a couple of pictures with the flash.

It’s a lousy shot, but under the circumstances and with the equipment at hand, good enough.

So – they will climb the hill. Duly noted.

I went out today to find a better resting place for Monsieur Badass than the middle of the driveway under Hissy’s wheel. While the ants and crows might have appreciated it, the bushes where he used to hide seemed more appropriate. When I looked up from placing him there, I spotted something under the Volvo.

Can you see it? He’s tiny, probably less than an inch long.

All I had was my iPhone, not the good camera with the telephoto lens, and he was deep in the shadows. But it was a brand new little lizard, probably in the sense of “very recently hatched” given his size and also in the sense of “first time I’ve seen it!” He was EXTREMELY skittish and bolted as soon as I made the smallest step toward him to get a better picture. That’s good! That’s how you stay alive long enough to get to the size of M. Badass or Dr. Lizardo!

A couple hours later I went out on a break and took the aforementioned good camera with the telephoto lens, hoping to find the tiny, tiny guy, but instead finding this guy.

Again, right where M. Badass always hung out, but I’ve never seen him (or her) either. Ever. It could be a huge coincidence. Or it could be that M. Badass was keeping all of the ants and spiders to himself and these guys somehow know that he’s gone and they’re moving in.

Remember that scene in “When Harry Met Sally” where Billy Crystal is talking about how they should combine the obituaries and the apartment ads so that you could see who died and what sort of place is now on the market? This is the lizard version of that in real life!

While moving around and taking pictures I was probably 8′ to 10′ away and constantly waiting for him (or her) to bolt.

He (or she) was pretty patient as long as I stayed well outside his (or her) comfort zone. But in this picture, look behind her (or his) back legs, at that wide base of the tail that then gets much more narrow. Is that a sign that this is a female?

Or, as this picture clearly shows, is that just where she (or he) lost their tail and had to start re-growing it?

It turns out that when I squat down to take a ground level picture instead of standing up, THAT’s the key to “RUN!!!” Or at least scurry like hell to the safety of the tire. Um, let’s talk about that concept for a second…

Looking back, this dude (or dudette) has very distinctive markings and coloration. Those big black splotches behind the front legs, that regenerated tail, the big 3-D spots or warts above the front shoulders, the desert camo coloration.

Monsieur Badass might be off in the final patch of flowers, but there is apparently no shortage of replacements who want a warm spot on the driveway and are willing to risk his fate to get it. That’s good news – but I might wait a while to see if these guys get used to me and are willing to not run at first sight before I start getting too attached.

I guess it was inevitable.

I had gone into the office for the morning, so our favorite tough guy fence lizard was hiding from the birds and cats under the wheels of Hissy. When I got home I found that he had been squashed flat when The Long-Suffering Wife went out for errands.

I checked out the remains to confirm it was him – stumpy tail being re-grown, no feet and only partial legs on his left side. Yep. That’s him.

There are plenty of other lizards running around the yard, but I’ll miss Monsieur Badass. He was the only one that had been around long enough or was badass enough so that he didn’t run like hell as soon as I got within twenty feet of him. He would stick around and even seem to be listening if I felt like sitting down next to the driveway to chat.

Monsieur Badass has developed an annoying habit of treating it like a game of hide-and-seek when he’s sunning himself while simultaneously hiding from the crows by hiding under the tires of the car.

This is not Monsieur Badass but a different lizard. Still, you get the idea. M. Badass tends to be way, WAY in there in the shadow and it’s tough to get a decent picture of him there.

It’s COVID’s fault. For the past fifteen months these cars have only been driven twice a week, sometimes only once. To this generation of Household Fence Lizards, these are permanent objects.

But now that I’m going out several times a week, they have to either be shoo’d away from instant death by squishing flatter than a pancake, or they have to be squished to death (see, “flatter than a pancake” reference).

The guy shown in the picture and the other Doctor Lizardo clan are as skittish as normal lizards are, so if you walk to the care and look at them funny they’re scurrying for the bushes and rocks. No worries.

But Monsieur Badass is different! He’s started to turn it into a game.

First of all, he doesn’t run away when you approach. He’ll actually wait until I get to the car, bend over, and poke my finger or some paperwork at him.

Then, if he’s behind the rear tire, he’ll run around to the front side of the rear tire, which only means that he’ll get squished by the front tire.

So I poke at him again and he’ll run back around the backside of the rear tire. Poke again and he’ll go over to the left side rear tire. Poke again and he’ll go up behind one of the front tires…

This can go on for several minutes, especially when it’s HOT out there. He loves it! Me? Not so much.

Yesterday I thought that I had killed him. We did this whole dance, I knelt down on the scorching driveway to peek under the car, and it looked like “all clear!”

Just to make sure to scare him off if he was hiding I turn on the car, let it idle a minute (as well as get the air conditioning going on full), then put it into reverse and rock the car just a skosh a couple of times, let it roll back just a smidgen, and then finally back up slowly. I mean, jeez Louise! How much warning does he need?!

But then when I got down to the bottom of the driveway and was ready to back out into the street, I looked back up into the driveway and saw him sitting there, right where he would have been underneath the car as it backed up. From that distance I couldn’t tell if I had squished him or if he had been in the middle between the tires and I had backed right over him. He was gone when I got home a couple hours later and was back out there this morning, so it looks like he’s not only a Badass, but a Daredevil.

I want to think that he’s figured this out and he’s only moving as much as he needs to. Then I remember that his brain is like 1% the size of the head of a pin and the only three thoughts it’s capable of are “eat,” “lizard sex,” and “RUN!!”

Long live Monsieur Badass! Or, at least, if he gets squished as I’m backing out, let some crow haul off the carcass before I get back so that I can carry on in blissful ignorance!

California may be officially “open” again, but some of us are still about 99.99% up to our eyeballs in work between this and that and the other thing, so while I’ll be looking for new and different things to start sharing after 15 months of birds, flowers, lizards, and various celestial objects, that may take a few days to get to.

Again I’ve changed my nickname for the semi-tailless, completely left feet-less, dude on the left. I think “Warrior!” was the last thought I had, but it doesn’t just roll off the tongue when I’m chatting with him, so currently I’m going with “Monsieur Badass.”

Normally he’s more hiding near the tires rather than out in the open.

I don’t think this is Doctor Lizardo. My gut feeling is that this dude’s smaller, younger, different markings, and he looks to be still on his first tail. But it could be him and I might be clueless and making this up as I go along.

Then Monsieur Badass made this face right after sucking up a half-dozen ants that were foolishly trying to scoot along that groove between the bricks and concrete in front of him. Okay, that explains why he’s here instead of next to the tires. It’s dinner time!

Mmmm… Ants. There are lots of them around and they’re not real bright about changing course when the ants in front of them are running full tilt into the gaping maw of a tiny dinosaur relative.

That also explains the faceoff in the driveway between the two of them – those are Monsieur Badass’ ants, go find your own! And, in fact, about two seconds after I took this last picture, M. Badass did chase this dude away.

It’s a lizard eat ants sort of world out there.