Great Basin Whiptail

When I first did this post I had just one picture of a Great Basin Whiptail, taken in Joshua Tree National Park. It is a subpecies of the Western Whiptail and is found throughout all of Nevada, western and northern Utah, southwestern Arizona and the northern three-quarters of Southern California.

This is the same picture zoomed in.

I find a lot of the distinctions of the various subspecies of whiptails hard to follow. I also take heart from the pictures on the internet of this subspecies and find that most of the pictures are not much better than mine. They are hard to approach in the wild.

On April 3, 2010, I was in southern Joshua Tree National Park near Carey's Castle. I saw quite a few whiptails, but they are very difficult to photograph. This one is in the shade of a bush.

A closer view of the head.

On May 15, 2010, I was in the vicinity of Carey's Castle again and got a few more photos of a whiptail.

 Here is a closeup of its hind legs

and one of its back and head.