Critter Science
The Science of Animals
Imagine a scorpion up to 6 inches long, from tip to tip! Welcome the desert hairy scorpion. Few critters give people the heebie jeebies like scorpions. The predominant species of scorpion in the southwest is the Arizona bark scorpion. Those are
Aggressive, fast, and typically angry, it’s the Arizona giant centipede. There are two known types of centipedes living in the Sonoran Desert. One is the common desert centipede and the other is the giant desert centipede. Centipedes usually live in tropical regions, but
One of the noisier woodpeckers of the desert areas, it’s the Gila woodpecker. They are very common and easily found in and around groups of saguaro, or other giant cacti. They also live in trees along desert rivers, and have moved into towns and suburbs. The holes they carve out in
The western diamondback rattlesnake lives in deserts, forests, grassy plains, rocky hillsides and even along the coastline. They live in elevations from below sea level up to 6,500 feet. They can be found in Arizona, California, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma; as well as northern
The packrat, aka wood rat, trade rat, and pack rat (separate words) are called this due to their propensity to collect a variety of objects, trinkets, and bits of material to deposit in, in building of, their nests. They particularly love bright, small, shiny objects that they will
Believe it or not, the roadrunner belongs to the cuckoo family. These birds can be found in California to the southwestern corner of Missouri, and down to northern Mexico. They like to hang out in deserts, arid areas, grasslands, scrublands, woodlands, and urban areas. Hunting,
The coyote is found in all parts of the United States, sans Hawaii. They are also found in Canada, Mexico, and Central America. They can be found on plains, in fields, and around shrub-dense areas. Coyote dens are typically found in caves, rocky crevices, hollow logs, or dens of another
Sounds like a bad B-rated movie. But the bite of a Gila monster is nothing to laugh at. Gila monsters are not only the largest lizard native to the U.S., but they are 1 of only 2 venomous lizards in North America. Their name hails from Arizona’s Gila River basin, where
The Pacific mole crab, aka sand crab is found from Madelena Bay (Baja California) to Kodiak Island (Alaska). They have to deal with crashing waves, constantly shifting sand, tides coming in and out, seasonally changing beaches, and aquatic, land, and aerial based predators
Also known as the Beechey ground squirrel, after Frederick William Beechey, the California ground squirrel is a very common sight throughout most of California. These ground squirrels are found everywhere from central Washington through western Oregon, California, and