Spring is here, and the herpetofauna are becoming active once again. Here is a Gila monster (Heloderma suspectum) in a defensive posture. These lizards are venomous via grooves in the teeth, so a close approach is unwise. They move surprisingly quickly!

A certain groundhog is fond of predicting the end of the east coast’s winter – but it is unclear if these augurings have any bearing on the Sonoran desert, thousands of miles away. Perhaps the generalities of large-scale climate oscillations (El Niño, for example) couple these two parts of the world. This year the groundhog…