Reptile & Amphibian Forums

They are not so easy to approach, any luck photographing the ones that are frequently hunted and do not allow close approach ?

not sure what you mean by "DR West" All the pictures I have posted are from the west except the ZooDom pics. We were on the Hatian border, so the far south west of the country. In Pedernalles, they were impossible to get close to. I saw one at about 20 yrds. Our eyes met and he was down his hole. We trapped him the next day. Both rhinos and ricord were very wary. I got some pics but they are pretty far away. I have a nice rhino shot I will post that will show how close you can get. One of the guys helping us used to be a hunter, he had incredible vision to find these guys and he showed me how he would noose them, ingenious.

By DR west, I mean west of the lake where they are hunted, such as perdinales. We heard some big igs runing off, but never saw them. Was wondering if you guys had any better luck ? Would you concur that the ricords had darker coloration than those near the lake ? Also is Grupo Jaragua still leaving all the flags out to make the nest sites ?

I can count on one hand the iguanas we saw in pedernalles. You can hear them but they see you first and take off. They are very spooky. I can't really say about color, I didnt see enough. I was at two nest sights,"Fondos" and didnt see any flags, we were with Ernst who is doing all the work there. They have no idea how many and where iguanas are, both species. We did hear that there are ricords in Haiti.

I did not know they referred to the nests as "Fondos," but though of that as the name certain areas. Good to know that there are a few in Haiti. Are they still estimating the population based on the tail drag patterns ? Seems like a tough way to estimate an endangered species population.

yeah I should restate that. the area that the nests are found are called Fondos, its basically where all the dirt settles from erosion of the limestone cliffs. The nests themselves are just that, nests. Its also the dirt the people want to farm. I never heard any conversation about tail drags determining count. I cant imagine that being accurate except for proof they are there. There was a population biologist with us that was trying to figure the best approach to surveying. They still dont know of all the ricord locations(fondos) much less the #s.

Here is the picture. Salvador the ex-hunter that was with us saw this cornuta from the very back seat, of a Ford explorer through the smaller tinted windows. Oh yeah, were traveling on a very bumpy car path. I jumped out took this photo with a 50mm then zoomed in, the inset, took a step to get closer and it was gone in a crevice. It was about 20-30 feet up on what you can see is nasty limestone with lots of stuff to get stuck with. Anyway, thats about as close as you can get in areas where they have been hunted.

Looks familiar, Had the same problems.