Baby Horned Lizard

Saturday was a fun day. An absolute perfect game day. Of course, others might say it was perfect day for the first day of Dove hunting season. I thought I would be busier than I was in the visitor's center, but it was actually one of my slower Saturdays. Of course, it was game day. I know where I found myself at 6 o'clock, and that was in front of Shelby's tv watching the OU game (This took some doing as Shelby is a graduate from OSU). Very excited at all the tail OU kicked too. Pretty good start, I have to say.

About lunch time on Saturday, Shelby himself comes to visit me with a present. He had managed to pick up a baby Horned Lizard. I couldn't even tell its sex because it was so small. He (?) weighed less than a gram (probably 1/2 a gram) and was approximately 30 mm in length. He and I hung out at the visitor's center until 5:00. He, poor guy, hung out in an empty plastic coffee cup. Not really much to do except contemplate one's situation. But as there was no sun on him, he wasn't really "warm" enough to do much anyway.

5:00 is closing time on Saturdays. And it was on Saturday that Murphy's Law for customer based operations came into effect. I was locking the door at 5:01 whenever one last car pulled up. I hadn't had anybody for 2 hours, and then someone shows up right as I'm ready to leave. And of course, they were both very talkative. Normally, when I'm in "customer service" mode, this doesn't bother me. Course, when I'd been there for 7 hours straight and had a young horned lizard to play with, I wasn't nearly so excited to be chatting.

I shouldn't really complain - they didn't stay too long. I practically locked the door right as it closed shut behind them. Then it was picture time with my new friend. He wasn't all that happy about it, and nearly escaped once or twice. After pictures I took him back to the area where Shelby found him and released him. Again, no thanks. Course, you can't really expect impeccable manners from one so young. :)


Sunday and Monday were also great fun. I visited my grandmother, aunt, uncle, and cousins out in Western Oklahoma. The parental units even put in appearance on Labor Day. It was nice to not have to cook just for myself. It was also nice to have someone besides myself to talk to. :) haha. I hope I didn't just paint a picture of me in my bunkhouse every night mumbling to myself. It really doesn't happen. At least not every night.

I came back to the refuge last night. I met Shelby here in the office as I was feeding my internet addiction. He had come upon some hunters who had shot a quail that appeared to have something very wrong with it. It's beak was very deformed. Kind of like a growth or tumor on the beak. I took some pictures for him, so I'll go ahead and post them - but they're not pretty. If you happen to have seen something like this before, please let me know what it is.

Tomorrow I am going to give my very first environmental education program. I am going to do the kindergarten program and then maybe an hour later Emily is going to give the 1st/2nd grade program. Then on Thursday I'm giving another program to some 3rd graders. And next week, I have to have programs ready for a whole elementary school (K-6th grade). At the moment, I am very nervous. I hope I do okay, but I'll let you know either way.