This past month, we’ve been mega busy setting up and monitoring pitfall traps in various locations as well as doing recon for seed collections here in Carlsbad. Our pitfall traps are set up in dunes for a presence/absence survey of the dunes sagebrush lizard, Sceloporus arenicolus. This species is not yet listed as endangered, but it’s been proposed by the US Fish & Wildlife Service. Its numbers have dramatically decreased because its habitat in sandy dunes dusted with shinnery oak and sand sagebrush are also prime locations for oil wells. Although we haven’t yet found any dunes sagebrush lizards in the locations surveyed, we have found many side-blotched lizards as well some Texas horned lizards and common lesser earless lizards.

Side-blotched lizard- Uta stansburiana

Texas horned lizard- Phrynosoma cornutum 

Common lesser earless lizard-Holbrookia maculata

Rifling through the pitfall traps

To determine whether or not we are recapturing the same individuals, we sharpie the digits of any lizard caught before releasing it from the trap. On the tinier juvenile lizards which are starting to become abundant as eggs hatch, this can be a little tricky! In addition to lizard monitoring at these sites, we’ve also started on an insect collection since so many insects are often caught in the traps. There hasn’t been much study on the insect diversity in the area, so I look forward to identifying the insects we’ve collected so far.

Besides our weekly lizard monitoring, we did our first seed collection this month!

Ratibida columnifera– our first seed collection!

Along with the HACU interns at the BLM, we also did a cleanup at a nearby recreation area, Conoco Lake, which included milkweed planting to set up monarch waystations! The cleanup was super, and we are planning on planting more milkweed in several other sites in the coming weeks both for restoration and to set up more waystations.

Me and two of the HACU interns, Jorge and Nicole, planting some milkweed!

Meridith McClure- Carlsbad, New Mexico BLM