Desert Creatures

I saw this lizard outside a museum where Paige works on campus.

Yes this was a dead rattlesnake, which was gruesome but also fascinating because we could get very close and really look at it. It was huge.

I saw my first Gila monster on a walk with a friend. It's rare to see one. Fun fact - they're venomous but move too slow to attack you unless you're trying to be attacked. 

And for this next creature, you need to know I finally bought lights for the backyard. We were loving the first night with them, sitting outside as it got darker. With the new lights, our yard was no longer pitch black. 

And then in the soft glow of one of the lights, we saw a tarantula in our yard. !!!! I quickly ran for a flashlight because I did not want to lose sight of where it went.

Dan was going to nicely scoop it and relocate it, but the moment he touched it, that spider ran sooooo fast up the wall.

It climbed the mesh part that keeps snakes out but definitely not spiders, and then it climbed down the other side and went off into the desert.

This is what a tarantula looks like underneath. I wish I didn't know. I want all desert creatures to stay outside of our walled-in backyard.