Reptile & Amphibian Forums

So, its memorial day and I have to make a run to Carlsbad, NM for my work, delivering computers I build for the oil field. I talked to my boss and told him I wouldn’t be home until late, and that I would use up a ton of gas because I would be herping my way back that evening. I was working a holiday, and doing him a favor by running these items up in my POV anyways so he was happy to hear that I would do something worth while with the impromptu trip. On the way to Carlsbad, just across the New Mexico state line, there started a line of DOR Bull Snakes that almost made me cry. Gloria (my wife) and I counted no less than 7 DOR on the way there. I got to Carlsbad dropped off the goods, and had some time to kill, went to the Living Desert Zoo thingy, sort of a waste of time, John Hollister, and I combined have a better collection than those sad looking critters. There was an upside however, all over the rocks throughout the park there where tons of these pretty little fence lizards with blue bellies, gorgeous little guys, I managed to Ninja Hand* (my way of saying “grab-really-damn-fast”) a couple of them, to take pictures and mull over. Gloria reached into my pocket and took my wallet out at this point, and started to shove lizards in my right front pocket, gee what fun. Later on the way out two of the little guys managed to scurry out of my pocket, under my shirt and jump out near the neck line, fly through the air and into the men’s bathroom, attempts to recover the errant reptiles failed after steadying myself on the toilet lid to reach for them and promptly loosing balance, my right hand plunging into the toilet, 10 minutes of scrubbing ensued (the toilet was empty at the time).
We left the zoo, and headed back towards Orla, yes Orla, a place seldom people herp, and that’s fortunate for me, it’s a prime Mecca of herping adventure. It was around 5pm when we arrived (after seeing 4 MORE DOR Bull snakes and 1 Western Coach whip DOR on the way back…18 wheels of death, damn it..) Right in the middle of what used to be Orla, there are tons of dilapidated old houses, with acres of tin to flip, Great Plains Skinks, and miscellaneous lizards prevail! I haven’t identified some of the critters we caught, I will have to post pics later for help with that. After flipping a board that was no bigger than 18 inches by 10 inches, I noticed a little movement and brushed away some dirt from a mouse hole, and BINGO! A Banded Gecko, glorious and very gravid, happy as can be and totally perfect found its way into my collection. (its yours if you want it Tom Zilla) we flipped a VERY green and highly active (aggressive) WDB, as well as a Western Coach Whip, a night snake (further up the road at a abandoned ranch house. The night snake is gorgeous pink and a mottled purple, haven’t seen one like it Gloria immediately fell in love, and it now resides in my new shoe box rack system (Thanks Tanner!) it was getting dark by this time and so we decided to do a little road cruising on The Super Secret Spledida Road (TSSSR) and WHAM not ¼ mile down the road we caught our first Splendida of the night, gorgeous big wonderful happy, non nippy animal. He is quite happy in the cages I got from John Hollister. We also found another AOR night snake, 2 Texas Long Nose and one Kansas Glossy AOR. We moved them off the road and drove on, Texas Toads, and Couches (sp?) Spade Foot abounded last night.
I forgot to mention I also picked up a neat little Desert Shrew, I Ninja Handed from under a piece of tin sharing his space with the WDB mentioned earlier. I would HIGHLY suggest that no one ‘Ninja Hand’ these guys bare handed like I did, let me speak from experience, they COME ALIVE when you do so. I would liken the experience to grabbing a electric stapler going a million miles a hour. It is a experience I will not forget.
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To you im just the crazy snake guy, but to some I'm a 'Herp'.

How 'bout a pic of the big guy?
Todd Hughes

his name is Elvis, John Hollister probed him for me, in his search for a female splendida. I he promptly ate a 3 mice and was still looking for more, so i gave him a weenling rat, ate that to. He is in shed at the moment, but after he sheds i will be takeing some pictures of him, i have the link to some of the pictures i have taken of the critters i have caught in these escapades. www.herpzilla.com/eric
Link

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To you im just the crazy snake guy, but to some I'm a 'Herp'.