On Wednesday, January 21, my intern partner, Corey B., and I were on a snail hunt along a partially constructed trail just outside of the city of Redding.** During a pause on the trail, I heard what sounded like a small helicopter come whirring in past my left side. The proximity and sudden arrival of the sound startled me. It’s volume told me the critter was far too large to be a bee, which were also in the area, but then what could it be? I glanced up just in time to see the outline of a hummingbird before it disappeared among the manzanita. Even now, I find the experience a little surreal; the abrupt arrival and departure of such a small, beautiful thing accompanied by an almost unreal sound. My thought as the bird departed: ‘I am in paradise.’

**Our assigned task was to relocate survey sites from 2014 and to establish whether snails – or to be more formal “terrestrial mollusks” – were still occupying the sites. In particular, we were interested in finding Helminthoglypta hertleini, a California BLM sensitive species, and we had to be careful not to confuse it with Monadenia churchi, another species of very similar appearance, but not considered sensitive. The snail hunt came with mixed success, and in the process, we found this really cool lizard!