July 23

One of our cotton mice.
We caught our first mammal at Long Tin site this morning. It was a cute cotton mouse (Peromyscus gossypinus), and like most of the other mice we have found he did not have any ticks. At Four mile we had a male scelop (Sceloporus undulatus ). They are so beautiful. He was a dark grey/charcoal color and had brilliant blue scales on his stomach. He had a lot of mites by his armpits and ears but no nymphs or adults. This is a good sign because it means he was walking around where ticks are (it just may be too hot for the other life stages to be out). We also had a recap of a mouse at Dry Bay but he got free before we could finish processing him.
This afternoon we flagged at Dry Bay and found only one adult dog tick (not what we want). In one of the pitfalls at Long Tin we caught an adult female broadheaded skink (Scincella laticeps). She was huge, over 100 mm long. Like the scelop she had a lot of mites but nothing else. Hopefully we get some more animals tomorrow but if it’s the heat that’s keeping them away we may not get so lucky, forecast says its going to 97° tomorrow.