I haven't posted a real report since last fall, so I guess I need to dump some pics on y'all. I cranked the herp season off with a Scincella scooting through some leaves..no pics. Being February and all, I did take some pics of my first snake:



Ringnecks aren't exactly a dime a dozen around here, so I took some more pics:



Beautiful, though somewhat stinky, little snakes.



Here's some nice habitat, where snakes don't seem to exist:



There must be timber and pygmy rattlesnakes in there, right, and hognoses too?



Oh well, some wandering dogs are always good company:



The Boxer was excited about something that only she knew....the Daschund and I just marveled at the spectacle.



The dynamic duo turned out to be pretty good at snipe springing, and it always surprised them:





I caught on after the first two, and finally caught a Wilson's Snipe on film:





After a fruitless herp outing, the duo followed me back to the yard, where they enjoyed my Fox, Coyote, Skunk, Opossum, and Raccoon bait from the night before:



At least something enjoyed it; I hate it when the wind doesn't blow into the forest!



Speaking of wind, does anyone know what happened to some southern Oklahoma topsoil in late February?











It was moving west to east...I dunno, did anyone from Arkansas have gritty teeth at around that time?



During the February bouts of conflicting warm and cold weather, I consoled myself with Cardinals:





I think my manual shutter speed was a bit slow on this one:





I gave up on herping for a while, but when you see turtles basking, something must be good:



Cooters can't be wrong!

Even the maps agreed with the other lowly emys:



Ouachita Map Turtles (Graptemys ouachitensis)



Time to start herping! First, I had to meet up with an enjoyable mix of personalities:



Tim, Mike, and Scott.



The salamander that they took better photos of looks like this:



Plethodon Sequoyah->>>>Sequoyah Slimy Salamander!



I thought this animal was prettier and less slimy, though the pic could have done without that annoying blade of vegetation, and I'm sure a polarizer would have helped:



Southern Leopard Frog (Lithobates sphenocephalus)



Some more slime:



Plethodon kiamichi....can you figure out the common name? A bit more robust than the Sequoyah specific, though they look at each other across a valley.



We found these guys in a strange microhabitat:



Many-ribbed Salamander (Eurycea m. multiplicata)





E. multiplicata are generally known to inhabit flowing stream type habitats.



The frogs were cooperative:









Strecker's Chorus Frog (Pseudacris streckeri)











Spotted Chorus Frog (Pseudacris clarkii)



It was a long season for these guys:



Crawfish Frog (Lithobates areolatus)



A nice looking copperhead that was crossing the road on a rainy night:









Recently, my favorite find was this gravid Southern Coal Skink:



I have searched for anthracinus in this general area before, several times, but always came up empty handed. The area it came from is more or less the western extent of their range. Here's a habitat shot:



She was found under the large rock in the center of the photo. I'll have to go back there to see if I can turn up some more, along with Leptotyphlops. I held onto her so that I can take photos of the jet-black, coal if you will, babies.

Just for good measure, here's a male that Scott W. found much farther east, in the Ouachita Mtns.:





Last week I headed to an area east of me that I have been eyeballing for the past couple of years. If there are coral snakes in OK, then I think it would be a likely place to find them. No luck on the corals, but I did turn up a few things. First was this Speckled King under a piece of particle board on the side of the road:



She had very even "speckling" for a few inches behind her head...if that were to continue for the entire length, it would make for a particularly attractive holbrooki.



At another spot, I came across this scattering of junk; Fix Or Repair Daily:



I found a pair of coachwhips and a ratsnake under that junk.

Male:



Female:



I made the mistake of taking the pics in very hard light, so I had to lighten the second pic to make it useable..hopefully I'll figure out the finer points of photography one of these days.

The ratsnake was a typical mix of lindheimeri and obsoleta:





Nerodia or not, these are beautiful snakes:



Broad-banded Watersnake



I found this one crossing the road:



Southern Black Racer

It had a rough time trying to escape on the smooth blacktop....it was funny watching it go ballistic, while practically staying in the same place.



I stopped at one area to flip some logs, and saw another racer going about its business of foraging. Just for sport, I decided to chase it down....even beside that, I needed a large snake so I could practice some shots with my wide angle lens. After a brief chase, and some unsuccessful grab attempts, I finally caught the snake as it tried to head up an embankment. Normally, I know better than to let a flailing racer get near my face, but in a brief moment of turning to get back on flat ground, my natural balancing motions brought the hand that was holding the snake toward my face.....the result:



Score for the racer! The initial hit was its snout right in my eye, and it scratched the inner surface of my lower eyelid.....that would have really sucked if it would have been a similar sized python! Needless to say, after that, I wasn't in the mood for practicing wide angle shots, lol



During the spell of cool weather last week, I decided it would be a good time to flip some rocks along road-cuts. In one area, I was surprised to find only one Tantilla gracilis, period. Habitat shot:





Road-cut:





At that particular cut, I noticed a few rocks that had some mild signs of being flipped. Given that I only noticed the signs on a few of the many good rocks, and no squished crickets, etc., and not at any of the other nearby cuts, I didn't give it any more thought. When I finished flipping that cut, I walked back along the base, and found this turned upside down:



Cool, you can never have too many herp containers. I grabbed it, and because I had the Tantilla secure in my other hand, or should I say that it had me securely by the skin under my wedding ring, I continued the short walk back to my truck. As I was walking along, I thought, why in the hell would a perfect herp container be here along the road.....a empty tub of margarine isn't exactly typical roadside litter. Sure enough, when I got back to the truck and opened it, I found this, stuck to the lid:



The forgotten victim was a gartersnake. At least whoever it was put the rocks back in place!

Here's the gracilis; a good sized one at ~8.5"





I flipped some other cuts in that area, and found this Yellow-bellied Racer under a piece of cardboard:





This Ornate Box Turtle, in situ:





And this coachwhip under a fallen billboard:





I also saw four more Flathead Snakes.



A couple of days later, I headed a bit farther west, hoping to find milks under roadside rocks. Only two areas had a concentration of rocks, after that I was forced to go through the monotonous process of driving along, and flipping individual rocks. I didn't have any luck with the milks, but I did turn up some other stuff. First, another ornata:



It's always fun to flip turtles!



Some Prarie Skinks:





This one had its original tail:





Prarie Skink habitat shot:





Ground Snake (almost in situ):





Dark colored racer:



With the exception of one other, all of the racers I've found in that area have been typical flaviventris. What is interesting to me is that the other exception was a DOR juvenile that I found nearby last fall. For lack of a better term, I will call the DOR anerythristic. Instead of the typical reddish-brown blotches, its blotches were gray, and its belly was cream colored, no yellow or red. Basically, the snake was just shades of gray and cream. "Anerythristic" wouldn't seem to be a particularly unfavorable trait for racers, as it pops up with regularity in other species. I don't know if that's the answer to that adult snake, but it seems likely.



Continuing on, rock to rock, I found my largest Prarie Ringneck so far, trying its best to be a gingerbread man cookie cutter:





The large colubrids were few and far between, but I did find a couple of holbrooki:









I was surprised that I didn't find prarie kings, rat snakes, or coachwhips, but I did flip a yellow-bellied water snake....no pics.



There were plenty of creepy-crawlies to go around:













And, the parting shot:



I need help flipping some of those rocks.....maybe a backhoe!



Shane
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