Chapter 10

Over the next day or so, I got my samples and my notes in order. Reg (older and wiser) had brought ethyl acetate with him, so I took my largest jar, crumpled two tissues and voila! A killing jar. Ethyl acetate has many advantages and is very widely used. Its fumes are less toxic to humans than those of the other agents and specimens will remain limp if they are left in an ethyl acetate killing jar for several days and the ethyl acetate is not allowed to entirely evaporate from the specimens. I employed it on my spiders and scorpions, too, even though that’s not the best. I didn’t treat the moth at all. Lepidoptera are fragile and lose wing color. I just packed it flat and carefully.

Late in the afternoon, Al asked whether I’d ‘risk’ another excursion with him in the morning. I said “sure,” as with only two exceptions, wherever we went would be new territory.

“Either due west or due north,” he said. “Do you have a preference?”

“None at all.”

“Did you see Reg’s prize?”

“No. I’ve been working for hours.”

“He came across a shingleback!”

“A what?”

Just then Reg came over.

“There you are! Did you use up all the ethyl acetate?”

“Far from it. Here, and thanks. Al was just telling me that you’d made a find.”

“Yes. Tiliqua rugosa, most commonly known as the shingleback lizard. It’s an omnivorous skink, it eats snails and insects, carrion and plants and spends a lot of its time browsing for food. It’s often seen basking on roadsides or other paved areas. This fella was basking on the sunny side of a dune.”

“Isn’t he common?” Al asked.

“Yes. But I’ll dissect his gut and see what he’s been having for dinner. I’ve seen no evidence of any land snails here, but one never knows. So probably some vegetation and insects. The shingleback’s not fast – I’d never catch one if they were. Thanks for the ethyl, Gordy. I’m off to kill the lizard.” He walked off, amused at his joke.

“So, what are you looking for?” I asked.

“Nothing ... and everything. I’m taking this trip seriously. We’re conducting a survey of the wildlife. But you and Reg are collecting. Lois is taking photos, not taking birds. And it would be hard for Aggie to collect anything except leaves or seeds. I don’t want to collect mammals, just see what’s around. So far, I’ve seen two kinds of mice, but I’m sure there are burrowers around. So, let’s see what we can find.”

We each took water and wore our hats. Al had a pair of gloves (‘critters bite’ he explained). We walked due north. After about half an hour, the sand changed color, from gray-tan to black-pink.

“Amazing!” I remarked.

“I wonder whether it’s from a windstream or what.”

“I don’t know much mineralogy -- or crystallography,” I said. “I just know that sand’s color is derived from its mineralogy, or the physical structure of the crystals that make up the sand. They can come from erosion of nearby landscape, volcanic eruptions, and even the grinding up of sea shells over centuries.”

“Yeah. But there hasn’t been a beach near here for millennia. And the volcanoes I know of were south-east of us. I would have thought this color would stem from iron-rich black and red lava rocks.”

“Blown here over a million years from the Pilbara?”

“Ask a geologist,” Al responded. “But the minerals might give rise to a variation in the residents. Let’s head for those tufts and look.”

I noted a number of anthills, a centimetre or so high and three to five in diameter. I noted a sentinel beside an opening. Melophorus bagoti. Of no interest at all. On another dozen strides, Al warned me.

“Watch out!”

“What?”

“Bulldogs. Must be a nest in those tufts.”

“Good thing you’ve gloves.”

“Are they of any interest?”

“Not really. I might take one, just to see whether they’re the same species as back near our camp. There are over 90 species here in Australia ... and one in New Caledonia. Every Australian species – and I handled all of them – is monomorphic.”

“Even the queens?”

“No. But among the workers. Hardly any variation. Queens are quite varied. Some are ergatoid. [Non-winged but sexually fertile.]”

“Weird.”

“As near as I can tell, everything’s weird. Look at that lizard of Reg’s. It was basking in the sun at nearly 40. Most reptiles hide in the shade or burrow at that temperature. Life adapts.”

“Yeah. That’s why there’s so many types.”

“I was telling Lois about Haldane the other day. In a speech he gave in 1951, he seems to have remarked that based on the fact that there are 400,000 species of beetles on this planet, but only 8,000 species of mammals, he had concluded that the Creator, if he exists, has a special preference for beetles. Four decades later, we’ve quadrupled the number of known beetle species. We’ve only begun real exploration.”