I was up in the northern Nevada desert the other weekend hunting for copper minerals like malachite, azurite & chrysocolla. Hiking around various mines there were bugs and lizards everywhere it seemed. This one lizard even jumped down on a rock right in front of me.
As I moved forward to see what was going on, it's lunch at my feet flew away. Seems it was actually trying to pounce on a grasshopper rather than impress me.
It was giving me the side eye look in disapproval.
It's expression had Bro? WTF? written all over it.
So having scared away it's lunch I felt bad and decided to try and make up for it by giving the poor lizard some water.
The temperature was in the mid 80's, not too hot, but probably hot enough that a refreshing drink of water would make us even.
I made sure the water bottle cap was topped off then went back to hunting for minerals.
When I went back about 20 minutes later the lizard was gone, but my bottle cap was still there. Seemed it had enough and went back to looking for it's meal. I also went back to looking for my meal makers and scored when I found this.
Malachite and chrysocolla. The rocks around in the background also contained the minerals pseudomalachite & libethenite. A very nice payday for me and maybe a gift my lizard friend led me to.
I thankfully did not encounter any rattlesnakes, just nice views, nice weather and great minerals.
Hope you're having a nice summer and staying cool.
Thanks for reading!
