Some Encouragement

NJSnakeMan

Explorer
Jun 3, 2004
332
0
33
Atlantic County
I was originally supposed to head out with Bobbleton to do some herping for anything rare.. unfortiently he was unable to find somebody to take his spot and couldn't take the day off.
That left me another crappy day of local herping. I got up, and headed out around 7:30 AM on my bike. First spot was at the local park....the usuals were seen, and heard. Redbelly turtles, painted turtles, musk turtles, and green frogs. When I was leaving I found my first snake on the prowl- a Northern Water Snake.
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Nothing else was found at the park. I took off on my bike another 20 minutes up the road. First I checked a spot which has yeilded lots of water snakes and green snakes last year....but nothing was in sight. I took the dirt road up to my salamander spot, fliped some rocks and there was a brand new marbled!
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A little further up was another Redbelly snake..... i've found a lot this year, but this was my first gray phased.
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No other snakes were found here...but here are 2 snakes I found earlier this month. Another little red phased Redbelly snake, and a DOR black racer.
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Well, in order to get into any promising looking potential pine snake habitat, i have to ride my bike an hour near Mays Landing. I walked around for awhile, an Eastern Kingbird was seen, some Towhees....what seemed to be a Cooper's Hawk, and my first Redheaded Woodpecker. It was around 1o:30am, and the sun was hitting hard. Lots of fowler's toads were seen, at the the same time I told my friend Andrew, "There should be a hognose around with all these toads." About 15 minutes later we were leaving and i saw a snake slithering, it was my first Hognose!! He immediatly killed himself =D ,but only spread his hood once. Nice, fat male.
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After a few minutes, he would peek his head up to see if we were still there.
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Worth more then twenty dollars to me!!!
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Bob...i'm going to PA for a week, i'll be back next monday, and won't have work until Saturday. We must get out. Until then, good herping!
 

uuglypher

Explorer
Jun 8, 2005
381
18
Estelline, SD
NJSnakeMan said:
That left me another crappy day of local herping.

I'd sure say you had a real good day! Beautiful photos, as we're coming to expect from you! That "dark phase" red-bellied was a new one on me! Never saw one of those. Quite a beautiful creature in a shibumi sort of way.

And those shots of the prevaricating hog-nosed are terrific. The close-up illustrates keeled scales very well.

Nice report.

Dave
 

dragoncjo

Piney
Aug 12, 2005
1,530
242
42
camden county
Nice pics, new camera? I've seen lots of fowlers toads, but no hognose yet. That the pine and kingsnake were the one's I wanted to find, I'm 2/3 of the ways there. If you guys are down in cumberland county let me know, I could show you some spots.
 

NJSnakeMan

Explorer
Jun 3, 2004
332
0
33
Atlantic County
I know there are some good Pine snake spots down in Cumberland Co. The closest i've ever gotten to finding a pine snake was at Manumuskin, 2 abandoned dens. Other then that- nothing!
 

woodjin

Piney
Nov 8, 2004
4,341
327
Near Mt. Misery
Wow!! Very nice. I wish I could just play dead like a hog nosed snake to get out of a bad situation. I'll try it next time I'm pulled over. I'll report back. Great photos.

Jeff
 

ChrisNJ

Explorer
Jan 31, 2006
149
0
Medford
great report, thanks

And what a beautiful snake that Hognose is, that is a species I have surprisingly never found alive but would love to see one.
 
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