Florida veterinarian John Rossi was confronted by a seven year old girl named Finley and her pet lizard, Mushu, who she thought was giving birth.  It looked like another tail was protruding from beneath Mushu’s tail. Rossi sedated the bearded dragon and began pulling on the second tail, and was rewarded with a pair of [...]

I have this video of me, standing in the patio of the Dallas apartment with my older daughter, and a little American Chameleon (Anolis carolinis) has hold of my finger in his tiny mouth and will not let go. No matter which way I turn my hand, that little guy is hanging on, biting as [...]

Out of all the reptiles I’ve caught and studied as a budding young Herpetologist, these wonderful little blue-bellied lizards were the hardiest and ultimately the most fascinating. Found nearly everywhere in California (with variations across most of North America) these rough-scaled, fast, nimble lizards get their name from brilliant patterns of blue on their relatively [...]

In the summer between 6th and 7th grade, my friends and I had formed a science club. I think we called it the “California Science Association” or something like that. It sounded very official and looked good on a letterhead, and we were able to get a lot of free scientific samples and hardware by [...]

Across the street from my childhood home was open desert, and when I was about 8 years old and was feeling the freedom of my first bicycle, my friends and I would go out and ride for miles down dirt roads that crisscrossed through the cactus and brush. We explored ruins of adobe buildings where [...]

I remember “spiny lizards” from my childhood as these huge scaly lizards as long as my arm that took two hands to hold. For young lizard hunters in my Tucson, Arizona neighborhood, these were the big game trophies. I caught one once, but don’t remember the details. I just remember holding it squirming in my [...]