Making the Best of a Bad Situation May 11th thru the 13th, 2018.

After busting hump all week at work, the weekend forecast was for cool and rain. Thanks, Mother Nature. You twat. Since Friday was a pretty decent weather day and it was still mild, we went over to a local spot after work and found a couple of snakes before dusk cooled things off too much. First up was a thick DeKay's Snake.


Then we flipped a sleeping Garter.

That was nice. We figured the rest of the animals were hunkered down, knowing that it was about to get shitty out.

So, with the forecast calling for cold and wet, I decided that I wanted to go to Western MA to look for Salamanders. A Hampden County vernal pool out there has been very good to us, with many kinds of frogs and salamanders being seen. If the weather is going to act like that, we were ready to play along. We did our two hour drive and got there late morning. It was drizzly and cool, as expected. What was not expected was the size of the vernal...

It had flooded over yards and yards of flipping habitat.

Undeterred, we flipped rocks and logs along the hills surrounding the pool. We came up with two Redbacks... the first had his head wedged into the log, which made for an amusing sight.

He was fine. I poked his leg and he popped out and scurried off.

The other was a Leadback.

We saw a few Leadbacks but this is the only one I could get the camera on. They usually outnumber Redbacks at this locale 2:1.

We drove through the park to get to a stream area. When things are rough, nothing is better than stream salamandering. We still needed a Dookie on the year, too. First up was a couple of shy Two-lined Salamanders.



Andrea finally struck Dusky gold with our First-of-Year Dookie!


Nearby, I flipped our first Pickerel Frog of the year.

He did not look thrilled.

So, two FOYs isn't a failure. Sure we drove 2 hours (each way) and got soaked but it's worth it. Our last shot was of a Leadback that confused me a lot when I uploaded it... looked a bit like a Dook, too. I put it out there to the internet experts and they all agreed with my first assumption of Leadback.

It's weird to get confused between two super-common species, but there you have it. Nature keeps me on my toes.

The next day, Sunday, was Mother's Day. We'd made plans with Andrea's Mom to go to New Hampshire to visit a Sheep and Wool Fest. It was fun and the weather was very nice. (Of course it was... we couldn't get out into the woods!) On the way home, we managed to make a quick pit-stop at a place in Essex County, MA where we've seen many Garter Snakes in the past. Now, Andrea's Mom is not a snake fan but with us in her life, she is learning to tolerate them. It was with great pride that I found a couple of wee Garters for her to see.

She wouldn't get close but she asked questions and admitted they were pretty. Baby steps.

We saw one other speedy Garter on the short walk.


So, that's how we do it. Roll with the punches. Of course, the upcoming weekend is calling for crappy weather again. We'll see what happens. If you hear of a bald, toothless guy in Boston snapping... it might well be me.

The PIT and the Terrapin. 5-5-2018

I signed Andrea and myself up for a Diamondback Terrapin seminar on Cape Cod for Saturday, May 5th. My intention was to learn more about the species and do a little field work with them. I started to wonder if I had done the right thing when it looked as though that day was going to be the only decent day of the weekend (and it was) and I'd basically signed us up to be inside most of the day. Oh well.

But the presentations were all excellent and our friend Tim was there, so we were in a room full of people who love and protect turtles! My kind of people, for sure. There was a coffee break mid-morning so Andrea and I went out to a pond that is favored by Bullfrogs to try to get our first ones of the year. We not only broke the seal, we destroyed it! A calamity of clamitans!


A trio of Bullies!


Ahh, that felt nice. With Bullfrogs (all frogs, really) being harder to find than in the past, it was great to see a lot of green noggins.

With a few minutes left to the break, we headed to a larger pond to see a couple of stacks of Painted Turtles enjoying the Cape sun.

^ hoist...


We went back to see some more presentations before lunch break. Our plans for lunch was to take a walk through Tim's Box Turtle Field© and see if anyone was up. He had seen plenty of his turtles recently. Sadly, he was unable to join us on our lunch-hour hike due to an injured Terrapin he was showing to a vet. We walked the woods and saw nothing. I started keeping an eye out for Ribbon Snakes because the sun was so warm. Andrea did, in fact, see one slither away. Figuring it was too dry for Box Turtles, we headed back. It was on the way back that I saw a yellow and black shell sticking out of the leaves. I gently uncovered the attached face.

Our first official Box Turtle of the year. The yellow dot shows that Tim has already measured and weighed this turtle this year.

Continuing back to the meeting, Andrea noticed a tunnel in the leaves. Sure enough, this shy Box Turtle was hunkered down.

Unmarked, we told Tim where to find it for later.

The rest of the meeting was very interesting and by mid-afternoon, we all prepared to head over to a nearby cove for Terrapin field work. Before leaving, we took Tim over to show him where the unmarked Boxie was. He recognized her right away as "Sleeping Beauty", a turtle who is always closed up tight when he encounters her. We got a brief glimpse of her face before she shut the door. Tim stayed behind to collect the data on her while we headed to the Terrapin spot.

We got to the site where we'd be looking for Terrapins and I made myself sexy.


We were in luck... Terrapin noggins were poking up all over the place! It would be easy pickin's!


(The official noggin-counter later said she'd counted 288 turtles.)

We were to go in teams at predesignated coordinates and net the Terrapins in our section. I teamed up with a smart and friendly gent with an impressive beard named Alan. We searched our section and saw not one Terrapin. So, we were lead to another section...


After coming up Terrapin-less on our second try, we were a little relieved to hear that it wasn't just us... this organized sweep wasn't bringing in many turtles. When we got back to our PIT station, there had only been a couple brought in. It definitely wasn't as easy as it looked like it was going to be!


Much to our delight, we were told to go back in, ignore the coordinates and get some turtles! Alan and I went back out to deeper waters to try our luck.


Alan struck pretty quickly and got three Terrapins in a short amount of time. I was having a much tougher go of it. I saw plenty of mating Horseshoe Crabs (I accidentally netted a solo one, too) but didn't see any turtles... until I stumbled across a good sized female. We took our buckets o' Terrapins to the "station".

When we got there, the free-for-all had produced many more specimens than the organized sweep had. Andrea was working with our friend Maureen (who had unfortunately injured her arm earlier) to measure, weigh and tag the animals.


^ Check out that molting shell!

^ Oh, the humiliation!

This is Alan's bucket of cuteness:


This is the one I found.

Getting her PIT (Passive Integrated Transponder) tag...



Alan and I went back out but we both came back empty handed. I tried the method of standing out in the deep water where multiple Terrapin heads would come up 10 or 15 feet from me. I figured that eventually, they would come closer. They didn't. One large one and I had a stand off so long that she yawned. It was time for me to admit defeat... I was bested by a turtle once again.

While we were out, Andrea had fallen in love with one of Alan's finds... a remarkably beautiful specimen who also had some spunk.


It wasn't just the shell that was so different and beautiful... look at those head markings.


Eventually, all of the Terrapins had been measured and tagged and it was time to take them back.

Alan and I had the honor of returning them.

It is Andrea's friend who was going in the wrong direction here... perhaps she wanted to stay a bit longer.


This young male was saved to be used as a classroom animal for the next morning. He was returned to his water Sunday afternoon.


Andrea walked down the beach to visit the other PIT station. Here are some of the turtles collected there.


^Another molting one.


So, do I regret spending the only sunny day of the weekend cooped up in a classroom? Hell, no! As you see, we got out and about, learned a lot and spent time with friends, both old and new and got to do something that will hopefully help these animals in the long run. A very rewarding day.

Of course, we were still two hours away from home. We figured we'd be hitting the state forest in Plymouth at about dusk so we planned on stopping over there. Of course, it was dry so the roads wouldn't be filled with anurans like we'd hoped, but we hit a few places to peek around in the dwindling light.

Under a discarded piece of carpet in the sand, we saw our First-of-Year Fowler's Toad, though he thinks he successfully hid from us.


I saw a small Ringneck Snake in a pile of rocks but couldn't get a photo before he slid in deeper. I did flip a board and saw two Redbacks and a Leadback.


Hey- where did that Leadback get to? He'd crawled under my shoe!


So, that was a long but enjoyable day. The last hour of driving got pretty tedious. I swear I was hallucinating by the time we got home. I kept seeing Terrapin noggins! Not really but I will admit that I slept like the dead that night.

And I'd do it all again today.

Mother, May I? May 1st and 3rd, 2018

Well, the weather decided to warm up for real but, sadly, it fell on a workday. Being the eager idiots that we are, we went for it and tried a few local spots after work on Tuesday, the first day of May. By 6:30 PM, it was still in the upper 70s. We decided to hit the local dens to see if anyone was still out. No snakes but we saw a couple of Redbacks.



With just a little bit of daylight left, we headed into Norfolk County to check on some easy to observe rocks. We struck gold (well, tan) with a wee DeKay's Snake who sped off as I clicked. Jerk.

Andrea then flipped a second, more shy, DeKay's.


Two days later, it was another steamer so we headed straight to the second spot, getting there at roughly 6:30 PM. Rain was threatening; it was hot and at about 300% humidity. The temps were good for our first American Toad on the year!


I got my camera on what I consider the true harbinger of Spring, the Red-winged Blackbird (#65).


A sexy gold-sparkled Leadback!


A larger American Toad, huddled up under a bike ramp. I hope he doesn't get squished.


We walked along the trail next to the train tracks hoping for a snake but the air was heavy and sprinkles were starting. Surely the animals weren't smarter than the humans! Again. But the humidity and incoming rain would be good for one thing... amphibians. The Peeper calls started to get deafening. We went up to a pool to try for a shot of one but I just couldn't find one to photograph. (It didn't help that it was getting dark rapidly and we'd forgotten our headlamps!) I mean, they were right there but I just couldn't see one.

Mother Nature threw us a very nice bone when we saw this lovely Leopard Frog next to the pool, our First-of-Year!

This is only the second Leopard we've ever seen at this park and the first in a few years.

We never did get a shot of a Peeper this night. But with two FOYs and a beautiful Thursday Night walk, we're not complaining.

Also of note was a lunchtime Red-eared Slider that Andrea saw in the lagoon on the Charles River on her lunch break earlier in the week.

Invasive, yes, but still beautiful and tenacious. I've yet to see one.