The Hunt for a Decent Weekend May 25th and 26th, 2018.

As usual, the best weather we had last week was on workdays, when we both were locked up tight in our separate hells. Temps in the 80s and sun, sun, sun. Andrea had the good fortune to twice see some urban Garter Snakes thriving in the garbage, sticks, and rocks along a very busy avenue on her way to
the train station.


It never fails to amaze me that these snakes can live in these harsh conditions, relying on rain water and worms for the most part. Surely 95% of the people walking past never even know they're there.

Friday night, we headed over to a local spot just inside Norfolk County at about 6 PM. It was still roughly 90° and we figured that as dusk approached, we might get lucky. Our first "sighting" was the shed skin of our target. We sought our first Milk Snake of 2018.

We sure would have loved to see the former owner of this skin.

Also, I was armed with a new camera. Andrea very generously gifted me a new Nikon for my birthday earlier in the week and I was dying to get my first animal shot. It turned out to be a lovely Redback that got the honor.


Testing the camera's zoom capability, I shot this Red Admiral from about 15-20 feet out. Pretty crisp.


This bunny was even further away.


Herp-wise, we next saw this Green Frog. Nearing the end of May and this is only the second one we've seen. 2018 is another tough year.


Our last sighting made me feel a little bad... we looked under a pallet that was over a ditch and this American Toad jumped in.

The edge was too precarious for me to try to go in so I put some branches in for him to climb out. If he wants to... the ditch was filthy with mosquitoes, a toad banquet.

That was it for the night... we went home with a pizza and got to sleep early for the next day. It looked like we were going to actually have a nice Saturday!!!!

We hit a favorite spot deep into Norfolk County hoping for some nesting turtles, frogs and snakes. It was well into the 80s by the time we arrived and we couldn't believe our good fortune when, not even completely out of the parking lot, we peeked over a stone fence and saw our First of Year Milk Snake.

He proved to be of interest to many of the people walking by. A mom practically forced her stroller-bound kid to touch it, even though the snake was biting me.



The stroller lady, having learned a bit about the park's residents from us, said she saw another snake right near where we sat. She sure did... a very in-the-blue Garter.


While Andrea powdered her nose to get ready for the actual hike, I saw another Garter in the same patch of bushes.


Before starting in earnest, this small American Toad stumbled out in front of us.

We were definitely off to a crackin' start.

This park, despite a lot of human foot traffic, still has plenty of animals. The ponds were quite high, as expected. Nestled into the shade, right in plain sight but not being seen by most people, this matched pair of Nerodia was resting.


Nearby, Andrea spied this other small male coming out of the water.


At a spot we call "the archipelago", though it isn't one, we saw this cool coil of Garter.


Alongside the archipelago, this high-red Water Snake was looking for a snack.

I had to practically grab it before a kid there saw it. Blind little dork.

Green Frogs were calling and we finally found this one. A big beauty, it would only call when we walked away. I had to settle for a deflated sac, man.


With the high water line, we expected the exposed perches to be filled with turtles but that just wasn't the case. This Painter had a prime slab of real estate all to himself.


We got to a waterfall spot, a gorgeous place that often has Nerodia present. A couple of kids rode up on bikes and I swear I heard one say "Water Snake". I asked if that's what they were looking for and the bespectacled nerd one said yes. I pointed one out that was laying low in the brush.

He said "Northern Water Snake?" (picture that in Richard Pryor's white-person voice) and I said, "yes". The kid was OK in my book, even though he didn't know the Latin and he said he'd seen a Hognose here before. (He hadn't. Wrong habitat.) Still, I told his parents that he was awesome and I hope they encourage him. They didn't call the cops, so that's good.

Distant basking spots were mostly turtle-less. One spot had a couple of Painters, though.


A section where we have seen Snappers and Painteds nesting (or cutting through to nest) has had a lot of sticks and shit removed from it so we were worried that they might have cleared it after nesting happened. Upon closer inspection, we doubted it happened that way... the clearing had been done a while ago and turtles should just be starting to nest. But who knows. We then flipped a very nice Ringneck.


We didn't see anything for a while until this Garter darted into the bushes. I pulled it out and we were amazed by the head markings. Check out those two white spots.

This poor guy also had a healing neck wound that made his neck lumpy. He nearly lost his head over something but is well on the way to healing. Note the disappearing dorsal stripe, too.

I'd found a peanut-butter cracker on the trail and saved it for the fish at one pond. These guys follow me for food so I didn't want to disappoint them.


Another Green... three in two days. Now, that's more like it!


We got back toward the beginning and looked into a little structure that Barn Swallows were flitting in and out of. I hadn't seen any nests earlier but I obviously hadn't been looking very closely. There were a half dozen and they all had occupants. They became my #70 bird on the year.



Heading back, Andrea spotted a large Bullfrog. I snapped this flattering photo.

He was twitching a bit and Andrea suggested the 'skeeters were bothering him. She was right.


Down by a stream I flipped a rock that looked promising for Two-lined Salamanders. There were two!



Check us out, we were at 9 species. But we were almost at the end of our walk. Just a couple more spots. But one of those spots was a fountain that held our tenth species, a Pickerel Frog, only our second on the year.


While I was working on that portrait, Andrea saw a speedy Garter go by under a tree and got a suitable voucher shot.


Before leaving, we took another peek behind the stone wall where the Milk and two Garters had been hours earlier. This beautiful Garter was sleeping it off in a patch of afternoon sunlight.


See? When we finally have decent weather, we have decent luck seeing animals. We were both very happy with the day, and I love my new camera. Can't wait to get back out.