Cutler Continues Kicking our Culos! 5-30-2011

Dare we herp 4 days in a row? Hell yeah!

We got an early start, planning to get to Cutler early enough to see some of those alleged Black Racers that we've heard stories about and seen skins from, but haven't ever seen in the flesh. Well, we got there by 10:30, which should have been OK, as it was overcast and cooler than it has been of late.

Our first herp was a lovely female Snapping Turtle who had just deposited some eggs in a sandy part of Cutler, right in the middle of a dirk-bike track!

She looked quite pleased with herself, and rightly so!




That got us all excited! We hit "Racer Alley" and saw a medium sized, yellowy Garter Snake, who took off before we could get a picture. Let it be known that he was THE FIRST snake that we've seen this year that we haven't been able to CATCH, much less photograph. Now I won't be so nervous about keeping the perfect record intact.

Racer Alley didn't cough up any Racers again. The sun came out and it got positively HOT when we were on that wide open trail. It's one of Cutler's sneaky ways of kicking you ass!

We got to the other side of the tunnel and found something good... an Eastern Milk Snake! We named him Bitey!




This is what happens when you go way in for a close-up...


Andrea managed to hold him without getting bitten, though he bit himself once!


We are, of course, very happy to add Milk Snakes to the list of snake species that can be found at Cutler.

We continued through the forest for a while and found a few more herps.Like this Leadback...


Some Green Frogs (we heard them calling throughout much of the marshland)...


and even a mammilian friend... a Chipmunk!

Chipmunks were all over the place, constantly surprising us or fooling us with sounds in bushes.

Our last herp of the day was this nice pale American Toad.


So that's Cutler in a nutshell... various species that you have to work HARD for! This trip was roughly 3 1/2 hours and, despite fairly flat trails, Cutler really takes it out on you! We left exhausted, eaten alive by bugs and burning up, but we marked it off as a successful trip. Cutler still hasn't lived up to its potential for us but I guess anything short of a Racer encounter will leave us mildly disappointed.

There's always next time...