L.B.S. 5-29-2011

This Sunday wasn't a planned herp day. We were still worn out from our huge day in Western Mass and we had a party to go to at night! Speaking of the party, we took some party stuff a block up the street to our friends, to drop it off.

Now, these good friends (who we'll call... umm... how about Kate and Snag!) have mentioned "little brown snakes" in their yard before, but I'd never seen one. Except for a flattened mummified snake... that was probably a Dekay's (aptly named that time...). We'd received calls from Kate... "little brown snake in yard", but said snake had moved on by the time we got there. Too bad, because Dekay's Snakes are high on our want-it list!

Well, they weren't home when we dropped by, so we contented ourselves by flipping rocks in their stone wall. All of a sudden Andrea yelled "Little Brown Snake"! She'd caught our first Dekay's Snake (now better known as Northern Browns) in our years of herping together!






This lil fella was surprisingly muscular for being so diminutive!

These little beauties are common in the area, but we'd never found one alive! 3 dead ones, but nothing alive! Now, thanks to some good friends letting us root around in their yard, we've added this species to our list! And I'm old school... I'm going to always call them Dekay's Snakes. Or the ol' L.B.S.

May 28th! All Out Toad ORGY in Windsor Mass!

Get your wah-wah guitars out and play along to these horny devils! We've got a nasty, X-rated, adults only post this time!!


It all began innocently enough... we went to the Mass Sheep and Wool Fest in Cummington... oh... I see. Yes. There was some foreshadowing there...

We had planned on going to the Windsor State Forest after, like we had done a few times in the past. We had seen many herps there before... Garters, Efts, and always plenty of toads. We'd even planned on camping there one year, just to get some extra herping in, but it fell through. Being 3 hours away from home, this is always a special trip.

I'd said one the way "I hope nobody else is there"! I got my wish. It seems the campground and parking area had fallen victim to budget cuts last year and the place was abandoned. Oh well... we parked across the street and snuck in, unsure if we were really trespassing or not, but assuming we weren't.

We decided to herp quickly, just in case. I moved to a couple of palettes that were lying near some bushes and flipped the top one...3 Red Efts were under it!!

It was a warm day and they got pretty cantankerous pretty fast!




So, already we were happy!

While photographing the Efts, a Wood Frog jumped by... I caught him to photograph...


Andrea somehow saw and caught a teeny Spring Peeper!



We saw an American Toad, who acted like he was missing out on something... I wonder what it was?!


Most of the Redbacks we saw were quick in the warm weather, but these guys stayed still long enough for a pic...



(A lovely coppery guy!)

Down closer to the river (the Westfield River), I found a toad that was buzzing in my hand like a cell phone on vibrate! The sound that we'd heard and wondered what it was seemed to be toads!


Andrea said... "look! Frog Porn!" She was photographing a couple in amplexus! We were very excited to be able to photograph this amazing event!


I got nearer the water and saw another couple... and another!! There were dozens and dozens of toads doin' it! There were guys aggressively forcing their way into threesomes and foursomes! Legs and warts were flailing everywhere!! Let's just sit back and enjoy some pornography, shall we?


(Wrapped up in strings of toad eggs!)




(A four-stack!)

("What about me?")






Eggs galore!

*Whew*... I need a cigarette!

While Andrea was pervertedly photographing the toad porn, I moved down a bit (there were still copulating toads, but less after a waterfall), I flipped an underwater rock and found this Two-Lined Salamander larvae...



Then I found another Eft. 6 efts in a day??? Unheard of!


We decided to look around the abandoned campground before we took off and were rewarded with a lovely Two-Lined Salamander!


No reptiles, but 7 different kinds of amphibians! Boy Howdy, that was a good trip!

May 27th, 2011... After Work Special

With the upcoming Memorial Day weekend, Andrea suspected that she'd be getting out of work early, so if she did, we were going to plan a late afternoon stroll through Hoar.

She did. So we did!

We pulled in at about 5PM. We realized that we'd never been there on a truly warm day, so this was new for us! Would it be too warm for sallies? Let's see!

Our first herp was a VERY active American Toad, who displayed an extremely spotty belly and enjoyed flailing around!



He soon settled and decided that hanging limply was his best defense!


Redbacks were at a minimum, as they often are when the temps get higher, and when we did see them, they had some good speed, making them difficult to photograph! This guy was a tad slower...


We got to one of our favorite parts of Hoar, a lovely pond/ stream, and were greeted by the sound of a detuned banjo string getting plucked... the Green Frogs were calling! There were quite a few!


(Feel free to use this pic for future Valentines cards!)



Then, cruising down the stream like the Hoar Ness Monster was a large Muskrat!! Very cool indeed!


There was a painted turtle mucking about under some duck weed, but he eluded our cameras! The bastard!

As we moved forward, we started wondering if we were going to see Hoar's signature herp... the Spotted Salamander...

We did! A pretty big guy, too!



Being warm, even the spotty was pretty active!

We added in a nice Leadback

and a small toad...


and headed home... very happy with our quick (hour and a half) excursion into nature. But it should be added... it was a buggy as fuck!

5-25-2011- Nature through the window

Just as I was posting the last entry, I was hearing some lively bird chatter outside of my window. Our cat Gibson was all atwitter, too. I looked out and saw a fledgling Robin on a branch, with his head cocked skyward, looking at an adult Robin who was singing from a post some 10 feet above.




I do believe it was a flying lesson in the works. This lasted for roughly 15 minutes until something scared off the adult, leaving the youngster alone.

The fledgling tried spreading out his little wings, stretching them. He didn't have much in the way of tail feather. He hopped along the branch a bit. He flapped his "wings" and "flew" a few inches along the same branch.

Andrea and I were watching and HOPING that he was going to get the hang of it, as dusk was setting in quickly.

After 5 or 10 minutes... all of a sudden, he took off... possibly for the first time ever! After a slew of false starts, he flew, about 15 feet up into the tree, probably to his nest!

This drama was amazing to watch. We're so happy for him that he made it back before darkness! And before the next train went by!