Reptile & Amphibian Forums

This last weekend I had the honor to get out with Steve Craig (Virginia), Jim Scharosch (Iowa), Mike Pingleton (Illinois), and Jeff LeClaire (Minnesota, and I hope I didnt spell your last name wrong Jeff!!!).

Steve, Jim, Mike and I got out on Sat to flip some tin. The weather wasnt too cooperative and we didnt find the one target species that they wanted to see, the Kentucky Corn snake. We did find 6 species of snakes though, and it wasnt a total bust. We still had fun getting out and I enjoyed the company of these really great guys!!

We found this guy under tin, and he was a little cold. He had some mouth rot that will probably shed out in a couple of sheds....

We also found a nice little Northern Red belly....

And this nice little Eastern Garter...

We also found some ringnecks.

Steve and I decided to spend the afternoon at Tioga falls. We hit some tin spots near there before doing some salamander hunting, and 20 feet from my truck we found this little guy on the crawl...
Prairie king..and it was one of our kings that Steve wanted to see!

We flipped some tin and found a copperhead.....

And another racer. No pics

We then hit Tioga falls for some salamanders and found some.

Rollup for Sat....
2 Black racers
1 Prairie king
1 Copperhead
1 Eastern garter
6 ringnecks
1 Northern redbelly
TMTC ground skinks
many 5 lined skinks
many 2 lined salamanders
many cave salamanders
many longtail salamanders
2 zigzag salamanders
1 Eastern box turtle

Then Sunday members of the Herp society that included:
Will, Phil, Clay, Wes, Barry, Ben, Joey, for a short time, myself and our guests, Mike, Jim, Steve and Jeff met up at the Jefferson forest visitor center to hit our study sites.

This day produced better than our finds the day before down in Hart county!!

Our first stop we decided to look for mud salamanders to allow the sun to warm the tin to optimum temps for snakes!!! And just as we were getting ready to give up looking for this elusive salamander, Mike Pingleton came through!!!

The second stop we found 5 Black racers and 1 Black king!!
Here is a group pic of the racers...

Jim Scharosch looking scared, and rightly so!!! LOL

The Black king...

Our next stop produced this copperhead...

This nice ringneck...

And this nice Earthsnake....

At our next spot we came across this little guy...
Male 5 lined skink

and another Earth snake.

Then we found another black racer and worm snake at the next spot...
Here is Will shooting pics of the worm snake, Barry ready with the hook incase the little Worm snake gets feisty, (safety first!!) Mike Pingleton holding the racer, Jeff LeClaire shooting video behind Clay, and Steve Craig at the right edge of the photo, holding a hook...

The next to last spot produced another copperhead...

A nice little red belly, and another ringneck.

At the last spot another worm snake, 2 fowlers toads, and another ground skink were found.

We then headed over to a local Queen snake hotspot to locate some Queens to photograph. Plenty of them were found along with some midland/northern water snake intergrades.

This exceptional specimen was found by Wes!!

The total rollup for sunday was:
Black racers - 6
Black Kings - 1
Ringnecks - 5
Copperheads - 2
Earthsnakes - 4
Northern redbelly - 1
Worm snake - 2
Midland/northern intergrade waters - 4
Queen snakes - 10
Many 2 lined salamanders
Longtail salamanders - 4
Green frogs -1
Fowlers toads - 3
Lots of streamside larvae and eggs
Mud salamander - 1
5 lined skinks - 2
many ground skinks
Blanchard cricket frog - 1

All in all it was a great weekend!!! All had lots of fun and the guest speakers did awesome presentations last night at the meeting!!!! Thanks to all 4 of you guys for coming down and spending a weekend in the field with the Kentucky Herp Society!!! Looking forward to getting out in the field with you all again!!
Brian
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RATS
1.0 Corn snake "Warpath"(KY locale)
1.0 Black rat snake "Havok" (KY locale)
1.1 Black rat snakes "Reaper and Mystique" (MO locale)
1.0 Albino Black rat snake "Malakai" (Dwight Good stock)
1.0 Everglades rat snake "Deadpool" (Dwight Good stock)
0.1 Greenish rat snake "Rogue" (Dwight Good stock)
1.0 Great plains rat snake "Reign Fire" (TX locale)
1.0 Grey rat snake "Punisher" (White oak phase)(Dwight Good stock)
1.0 Yellow rat snake "Wolverine" (Dwight Good stock)

Good luck and Happy Herping
Brian