During the summer months I can generally be found walking around the High Desert, camera in hand, looking for anything and everything to photograph.
For years, I have wanted to image one High Desert critter, but it has always escaped me. It's not that I haven't seen any...I've seen three. But each time, they never stayed in front of me long enough for me to get a shot of them.
Well, those Houdini critters are rattlesnakes. There are two species located in my area -- the Northern Pacific Rattlesnake and Great Basin Rattlesnake.
My brother and his family live in Texas and at one time, had a house in the hill country of San Antonio. There, they came across rattlers on a regular basis. But that did little to eliminate my nephew's fear of snakes. While he and one of his sons were visiting me last August, we went to nearby Cline Falls State Park to check things out.
As my brother and I wandered around tree area looking for bird we could hear, my nephew let out a shriek and loudly announced, "Snake!"
My brother and I immediately ran to him and asked where the snake was. He pointed down in some weeds near the river and I saw movement. Happy I had camera in hand and in front of the critter, I squatted down to get a better look. I snapped off a few images before the snake disappeared in the brush. When I joined my family, I told them it was nothing more than a Wandering Garter Snake. It was the first I had seen in Oregon, and the first snake other than a rattler I crossed paths with, so the sighting wasn't a total loss.
Wandering Garter Snake
Misty Dawn's Camera Critter Meme is a great way to see critters of all types. Go to the Meme homepage
here and check out more entries. Then join the fun and let the world see your critters!
