My husband and I took a quick trip to Yuma, Arizona last week. We left in a spring snowstorm that dropped three inches of wet snow on the Front Range area. We arrived in Yuma to 90 degree days.

We were lucky to go down in the spring, when the ocotilla were in bloom.

We only had a little time for getting out into a wetlands. But while we were there we got to see a few critters.

This snowy egret was wading in a much diminished Colorado River just below the famous Yuma Territorial Prison Museum.

To say that “this is a lizard I saw in Yuma, Arizona” doesn’t actually seem to narrow things down any. I haven’t studied lizards much, but a little research suggests that this is a desert spiny lizard. I think. Regardless she wasn’t very worried about us.

The lizard may well have been worried about this roadrunner, which we saw just a few moments later. I am particularly proud of this shot, in spite of a little blurriness, because I don’t actually remember going through the thoughts “There is a bird. It’s a roadrunner. I want to take a picture of it.” Instead, my reaction was all instinct — the shutter was clicking before I was conscious of bringing the camera up. That kind of instinct doesn’t kick in for me very often, but here, it resulted in a decent picture.

Next time, we’ll have to go down when we can spend more time in the wildlands. But for now, it was a good trip.