Collared lizards spend a lot of time basking on large granite rocks looking for something to chase down and devour. This one's tail is not quite complete, so it may have narrowly escaped being chased down and devoured itself.

On this warm cloudless morning, the boulders of 49 Palms Oasis Trail were crawling with chuckwallas and collared lizards. The collared lizards in the first two pictures are adopting a posture common to several of those we saw. One could imagine that they are stretching as high as possible for the most encompassing view, or trying to call attention to themselves to impress the opposite sex, but I believe they're just keeping their toes off the rock to prevent overheating.

The last one pictured here has very bright red bands across its body, signifying that it is a she and that she is in the breeding season. She does look pretty pudgy there, doesn't she?

This young collared lizard was, like most collared lizards I've seen, perched high on rock, surveying its kingdom for both prey and predator. It thought I was the latter, and so hunkered down into its "you can't see me because I'm flat against this rock" position, which might work against hawks or something but didn't work so well against me.

Collared lizards are so good-looking, I definitely don't see enough of them. Does anyone? Has anyone ever said "I have seen enough collared lizards"? That just doesn't seem like a sentence anyone would ever say.