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Locality: Brazos Bend State Park, Falcon State Park Camera Equipment: Canon Digital Rebel |
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Western Indigo Snake A piece of Liver Tissue is collected for DNA. Liver tissues contain high amounts of mitochondria, thus high amounts of mitochondrial DNA. "Mitochondrial DNA carries a record of direct maternal ancestry" (Freeman & Herron 2001). Mitochondria are only found in the tail of the sperm, since the tail is broken off, no mitochondrial DNA from the male gets passed to the egg. |
Checkered Garter Snake A piece of Liver Tissue is taken for DNA. The tissue is placed in a buffer solution.
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Western Indigo Snake Facial shot. |
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Formalin Dr. Hall is cross-linking proteins with Formalin injections. |
Audubon's or Scott's Oriole I can't remember what we decided what species this bird was. I found it on Rd 624 in McMullen County. N28° 06.308' W098° 26.0832' Elevation: 498 ft Time: 10:03 pm Date: May/26/2006. Given to Dr. Hall, who has federal permits to salvage died birds for educational purposes. Probably a first year Scott's Oriole. |
Marine Toad The infamous Marine Toad. Introduced to several parts of the world to control insect populations, but failed. Now they are just an invasive species around the global. It's naturally found in South Texas and Mexico. |
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Marine/Giant/Cane Toad (Bufo marinus) Check out the size of the parotoid glands on this thing! |
Study Skin Dr. Hall finishing up the Oriole. Now it just needs to be stuffed, and the study skin will be complete. |
Table 1 Table 1 is hard at studying, remembering family & latin names, along with keeping up with the field notebook. |
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Table 2 Sleeping, and just chillin. No worries in the world. |
Swimming in the Rio Grande The class is doing some seining at Salineno. Trying to look for pupfishes. Mean while, Dan is trying to figure out a way to give the class the whale. |
Away from the South Texas heat After a morning of hiking around in the South Texas heat, some shade is good. |
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Pupfish or Sheephead Minnow No luck on Pupfish, just a Sheephead Minnow. |
Indigo Snake Monica yells out, what is that thing crossing the Rio Grande, and I yell out Indigo Snake! |
Indigo X-ing Dr. Hall tried to play border patol, but no luck. Mean while, Dan's attempt at giving us the whale got side tracked by the Indigo. Personally, I'd rather see an Indigo Snake. LOL
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Green Kingfisher Green Kingfishers are super common here. There has been semesters where we have seen all three North American species of Kingfishers without having to move an inch. |
Seining Seining Seining Seining. |
Kendra and Monica Kendra and Monica posing for me. |
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Great Landscape Such a nice little habitat along the Rio Grande River.
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Thinking Pose Kendra thinks "Thinking Poses" make the best photographys. Hummmm... |
Northern Grasshopper Mouse (Onychomys leucogaster) A rodent that howls at the moon. The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum picked the Grasshopper Mouse over Pronhorns in their desert grasslands exhibit (Hancocks 2001). Thats how cool this rodent is. 90 percent of its diet is animal matter. |
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Hispid Cotton Rat (Sigmodon hispidus) A very common native rat, its found in every county in Texas (Schmidly 2004).
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Mockingbird Nest Mark Keithly checking out a Mockingbird Nest that the class found by the camp site. |
Merriam's Pocket Mouse (Perognathus merriami) A pocket mouse that enjoys sandy soils. I think I have found this species under rocks at Seminole Canyon State Park. |
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Merriam's Pocket Mouse (Perognathus merriami) After being released, he stayed around for a while for shots, then dashed into the tall grass that surrounds the camping area. |
Lesser Nighthawk Chick Lesser Nighthawk Chicks are semi-precocial. Two eggs are laid in a ground nest. |
Lesser Nighthawk Male nighthawks have white throat feathers (National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America 2002). Not a bad picture for hand held at 400 mm. That image stabilizer really makes a difference. |
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Lesser Nighthawk with Chick Dad with chick. I didn't seem the mom. |
Lesser Nighthawk with Chick Dad with chick. When it gets too hot, they move to the shade provided by the State Park Sign. |
Texas Tortoise (Gopherus berlandieri) Found on Rd 649 at 5:33 pm on 5/30/06. N 27° 00.141' W098° 53.979' Elevation: 615 ft. Texas Tortoises are threatened in Texas. |
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