Description

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"For families wanting to explore their local wildlife as well as an engaging read for those with a general interest in the subject.” —Booklist

The American West is home to a wide array of reptiles and amphibians-from the rare and curious to those that can be found in parks and backyards. With this user-friendly guide in hand, discover the most likely-to-be-encountered lizards, snakes, turtles, and amphibians native to Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington, plus the western parts of Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico.

Whether you are a dedicated herper or simply have a keen interest in wildlife and natural history, Sea Turtles to Sidewinders—from Charles Hood, Erin Westeen, and Jose Gabriel Martfnez-Fonsec—will help you appreciate and celebrate the amazing diversity represented by reptiles and amphibians of the West.

About the Author

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Charles Hood is a naturalist, adventurer, and poet. He has also been a factory worker, a ski instructor, a dishwasher, and a nature guide in Africa. Nature study has taken him to all fifty US states, eighty countries, and the South Pole. Along the way he has been lost in a whiteout in Tibet, contracted and survived bubonic plague, and published 20 books and over 800 photographs. His essay collection A Salad Only the Devil Would Eat was named the Nonfiction Book of the Year by the editors of Foreword book review. He lives in the Mojave Desert with two kayaks, two mountain bikes, two dogs, and 5,000 books.
Born in the San Francisco Bay Area, biologist Erin Westeen has been fascinated with herps since first spotting western fence lizards in her childhood backyard. She has done extensive fieldwork across western North America and the Neotropics and is currently a PhD candidate at UC Berkeley, where she studies spiny lizards. When not in the field, you can find her in one of the many natural history museums where she has been lucky enough to work.
José Gabriel Martínez-Fonseca is a Nicaraguan biologist and wildlife photographer who has been working with amphibians, reptiles, and mammals for over 12 years. Fascinated by snakes long before he caught his first at the age of 11, he later co-authored a Field Guide to the Amphibians and Reptiles of Nicaragua. He is currently a PhD student at Northern Arizona University, where he studies habitat fragmentation in the Neotropics and enjoys photographing as many species of amphibians and reptiles as possible.