Soon the desert cottontail creeps from his thicket to nibble pricklypear fruit. He stays close to home and prefers brushy terrain. The blacktailed jackrabbit passes the day in a form, a basin scratched out beneath some bush. He can cover the ground in enormous jumps, and his megaphone ears help cool him by dissipating body heat. The desert mule deer, another blacktailed, long-eared browser, may also appear at dusk to forage mesquite and lechuguilla. And a band of peccaries—or javelinas as they are also called—may rattle through the brush. They have a great fondness for pricklypear and their mouths are so tough they eat roots, fruits, pads, spines, and all. The ferocity of these wild pig relatives is more fiction than fact. If you meet one face to face, he may take a few steps toward you, but not out of meanness. He’s nearsighted! Evening can linger a long time in the desert and night can strike quickly as a cat’s paw. You watch the sun go down, turning the clouds above the Chisos red, painting Sierra del Carmen crimson, while a single golden shaft breaks through the clouds and hits El Pico like a spotlight. Then the sky goes smoky blue and mauve over the eastern mountains, and the clouds to the west turn ashen as burned out coals. Lizards [Illustration: Collared lizard (male)] [Illustration: Texas banded gecko (adult)] [Illustration: Texas alligator lizard] [Illustration: Twin-spotted spiny lizard] [Illustration: Collared lizard (pregnant female)] [Illustration: Texas banded gecko (young)] [Illustration: Marbled whiptail] [Illustration: Big Bend gecko] Snakes [Illustration: Western hognose snake] [Illustration: Mexican milk snake] [Illustration: Blacktail rattlesnake] [Illustration: Trans-Pecos blind snake] [Illustration: Western coachwhip snake] [Illustration: Trans-Pecos rat snake] [Illustration: Western diamondback rattlesnake] [Illustration: Blackneck garter snake] [Illustration: Baird’s rat snake] [Illustration: Big Bend patchnose snake] [Illustration: Texas lyre snake] [Illustration: Glossy snake] [Illustration: Mohave rattlesnake] [Illustration: Longnose snake] [Illustration: Black-hooded snake] [Illustration: Bullsnake] Two Non-Drinkers [Illustration: The kangaroo rat and roadrunner exemplify adaptations for desert living. Neither drinks water, as a rule. The roadrunner gets its moisture largely from its omnivorous diet, which includes lizards and small rattlesnakes. It kills them with stunning blows of its beak. Its characteristic X-track provides good traction in sand. Agile and nimble, this 60-centimeter- (2-foot) long bird can fly, but it prefers to run, at up to 32 kph (20 mph). Mexicans call the roadrunner _paisano_, “fellow countryman.”