Friday- up at the ass crack of dawn, we headed over to our heartbreak spot in Plymouth County rather than go to work. We got there plenty early, in fact the temps were still in the 60s. We figured that would be good for fossorial snakes. Well, it was, in fact. Our first find was this hatchling Ringneck! Three inches of coal-black fury!
We'd seen none in August, so this is a good start to the month.
We saw nothing else in the area from flipping but down by the vernal, we saw a very small, very spotty Spotted Salamander under a log. This is pretty exciting... the vernal lasted long enough!
Next stop was, as it always is, the bogs. This always gives us a lot of pretty Bullfrogs.
Every once in a while, I can photograph a small Painted Turtle in this bog before he slides in. This is one of three that we saw.
A Fowler's Toad that was hiding under a work bucket left near the bog.
A Bully on moss. Funny, we didn't see or hear any Greens this time out.
Between bogs, Andrea made an extraordinary discovery.
It's a hatchling Red-bellied Turtle, an endangered species in Massachusetts. Now, they have made a great comeback due to years of head-starting hatchlings but seeing one that was born in the wild is very exciting.
Of course, being endangered, we can't touch it, but somehow, it made it to a safe spot by the pond where it slowly walked into the water, then buried itself into the mud. Our hearts were filled with warmth.
This small Bullfrog promised not to get too big too fast and eat it. I made the turtle promise the same.
What a day already! We saw this pretty orange Fowler's on the way out.
It was time to come back down to Earth. Our next stop is out best Hognose spot, but it takes a lot of work and patience to see one. One thing we have come to realize... if they're not there, you won't see 'em. Well, we did the full walk, which is roughly two miles of hiking... up and down the trails. In the couple of hours spent, we saw plenty of toads (all Fowler's) which is the favorite lunch of Hognoses and Garters, but saw no snakes. Our only non-toad sighting was a new Wood Frog, who seemed really out of place.
I'm not sure where the water source of his origin is, but there's obviously a pond or vernal close by that we don't know about.
Pretty much beaten down from that last stop, we went for one last spot, in hopes of a Racer or Garter or anything. The reliable log in the pond (that isn't usually very reliable once the water heats up a bit by late summer) had a couple of turtles on it... a massive Red-belly (will that hatchling get this big?!) and a Painter.
Distant log perches had some Painters up.
We took one last walk out the peninsula (where there are lovely benches to sit on) before heading home. Passing a tree that was sloughing it's bark, I said, "no, I'm not flipping bark!" then went and flipped some anyway. I'm glad I did.
Only our second Red-bellied Snake of the year, and a cutie-pie it is.
Probably last year's model. Maybe two years old.
That was a decent ending to an exciting, then dull, then exciting day. After relaxing, we headed back to the car for our drive back home to Boston.
One little addendum... I'd sure like to get a peek under the porch of the Visitor's Center... there were two good sized Racer sheds leading right under it!
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