Desert Monster Tries to Survive in the American Southwest | National Geographic
The Gila monster is the most charismatic reptile we have in Arizona, for sure. We have seen temperatures increasing in the Tucson area. Gila monsters, you know, depend on humidity, and if humidity goes down lower earlier in the season, that could affect their activities. For Gila monsters, that might be a big deal because they tend to be actually not a very well physiologically adapted desert species in the sense that they lose water across their skin pretty easily.
The Gila monster has the distinction of being one of only two potentially dangerously venomous lizards in the world. This is a really cool lizard that people can really relate to. It's a symbol of the Southwest, and it's something that we care about deeply.
Gila monsters are pretty mysterious animals; you don't see them. They spend a lot of their time underground, but I think everybody remembers the first time they ever saw one. They're large, they're colorful, and they don't look like other lizards. The Gila monster is one of only two species in the beaded lizard family. They're called that because if you were to feel the top surface of a Gila monster, you would feel little bumps on it.
When you see it, it doesn't look really fleet and fast. It's not. The Gila monster actually has evolved to be a nest predator, so it doesn't have to be fast. If you see one and it doesn't see you, you can track them for a mile. What you do is let the animal just be, whenever it's not in its field of vision. Then you can gain ground and follow it.
If it gets even hotter and drier, you might at some point run out of appropriate habitat for healing. Fortunately, we do have areas that are set aside that are natural, you know, that are the protected home for Gila monsters, like our National Park. But, you know, those areas are those natural desert areas. There are fewer acres of that every year.
The Wyoming toad is found only in the Laramie Plains of Wyoming. It's found nowhere else in the world, and it has the maybe unfortunate distinction of being one of the most endangered amphibians in North America, and I think the most endangered amphibian in the United States.