Le premier lézard de Becky (Becky’s first lizard)

A large, handsome male Podarcis muralis lives in the rock wall behind our house. I had been trying to catch him, unsuccessfully, for several weeks. My wife Becky has never caught a lizard in her life. Already, you can see where this is going.

As part of our current experiment, we are collecting male lizards from several populations at elevations around 400-500 meters above sea level so that we can see how they respond to high elevations (see earlier post withdetails). One of these populations is the small hamlet of Astien, which we are very happy to call our home in France. Astien is a small cluster of houses with about 30-40 residents about a kilometer uphill from Engomer. There are lots of old stone walls and buildings, which provide great habitat for plenty of Podarcis. I must say there is great appeal in conducting fieldwork in your own backyard!

We are sampling each population for the experiment on two different days. The first sampling day in Astien, I had several good opportunities to catch the big male living behind our house and really blew it. I found solace knowing that I would have another chance. On the second day, however, he completely shirked me again – either fleeing before I could get close enough or somehow magically evading the string that I swore was in perfect position to catch him. After the long day in the field, I returned home from the lab with the lizard-catching pole, thinking that the evening might provide another opportunity (in other words, I was completely obsessed with catching this damn lizard).

The wall that is home to the now-captured lizard.

Immediately after getting home, I started to prowl around the wall looking for my quarry. Becky came out to see what I was doing (though she’s used to this kind of thing) and said, “How does it work? Why don’t you show me how to do it?” So I took a few seconds and briefly described how to set the knot properly and the basic idea behind noosing a lizard. The big male came out again and Becky said, “Let me try!” Hesitantly, I let her take the pole and make a few unsuccessful attempts, on par with my previous work. Skeptical and frustrated, I left her outside and went back in the house to get things going for dinner. Not a minute later I heard her exclaim, “I got it!!!” Of course, Becky had snagged the lizard! She was quite proud of her first catch, but maybe not as much as me!

Becky lizard hunting.

This little episode provides a humbling example of how it’s sometimes best to trust someone else to take over. It also provides a reminder of the many, many less obvious ways that Becky has made enormous behind-the scenes contributions to this project (not to mention moving to France…). We’ve had many Saturday-morning conversations that go something like this:

Becky: What should we do today?

Me: Uhh…I’ve got to go catch lizards, then maybe we could do something?

(Or, I’ve got to go do some lab work; or, I’ve got to go run some lizards on a race track; or, well, you get the idea…)

So, this post serves a big ‘thank you’ to Becky especially for all of the understanding, patience, and support that allows a family to have a scientist. Often, I don’t do a good enough job of describing in advance what I’ll be doing and what that schedule entails. And certainly not often enough do I express my deep gratitude for all the extra hours Becky’s tended the kids while I’m working, the ‘family vacations’ that involve lots of manuscript editing, and the week-ends that somehow end up being just as work-filled as the week days. So here’s to all the spouses, partners, friends, and family members that make all this possible…and even occasionally catch a lizard for you! Thank you!