Recent Herping Trips

Here is a video from one of our most recent herping excursions...

Here are some pictures from that same trip:

My most recent herping trip was today (May 14, 2009). I had a little success. No video but here are the best pictures I shot:

Field Shots near Brown's Woods State Park

Me and my son went to a place just outside of Brown's Woods Park. Actually it was a soccer field that had been recently flooded from all of our recent flooding. We had been told about a story that appeared in the paper where people were cleaning up flood debris out of this soccer field and it was littered with snakes. So we thought we should go and check this out.



We walked the outskirts of the field and only encountered a whole lot of frogs. Here's a couple of smaller American Toads we found along that walk.



From there we encountered this very fiesty Brown Snake when we flipped a trash can over.



Near the entrance of the soccer field we saw a couple of pieces of plywood in the grass. When we flipped them, we found this beautiful Fox Snake. He was around 24 inches long and had quite a fiesty spirit at first, but after a while, like most fox snakes, he calmed right down and was handled rather easily and freely.



Under the same plywood was several Eastern Garter Snakes. This one was real skittish and kept trying to hide his head under his body (something I haven't seen so much in garter snakes, but more so in racers).



All in all, we had a real good trip looking for snakes, it was just incredible hot outside. Now is a very good time of year to do "flipping" for snakes because of their tendency to lay low during the summer heat. Most snakes are more active at night during this time of year in Iowa because of the heat.

Some Field Shots from Earlham, Iowa

A week back I was in Earlham, Iowa at a camp overnight...and of course, while I was there I did some herping. Here are some of the shots:

This is a Cope's Gray Tree Frog. There was quite a bit of calling going on between these creatures and they were very loud.

Here's another one in a small pool-like area at the end of a slide. There were lots of these frogs around this area. As I said, they were very loud.

With all the calling going on, love was in the air! One interesting attribute of the Cope's Gray Tree Frog is that they can change colors in a matter of seconds. The colors of this frog vary from bright green to gray to brown. It's pretty cool!


Here is a shot of an American Toad. These guys are plentiful in this area. They are another species that varies quite a bit in color patterns.


For another shot, look at this American Toad. He is almost black compared to the other toad I had shot. Same area, just a large variety in coloration among these toads.



Here's a little Eastern Garter Snake. You can see from his eyes that he is ready to shed. I found him by flipping an old piece of tin. Actually he was sharing the same space as the black American Toad.


This is a baby American Toad. He was so tiny. Look at the next shot...

It took me about 30 shots to get him to stay still long enough in my palm to get a shot like this. He was a really cool little toad.

These next two shots aren't herp species but they are interesting shots nonetheless...


This is an Iowa Pleistocene Snail. It is actually an endangered species in Iowa (I had no idea!), I think snails are really interesting creatures. They also make up the diet of many different herp species in Iowa!


This is some kind of a field mouse. Not sure honestly what it's actual name would be. He never tried to bite me. He had a shorter tail. The field I caught him in had been freshly mowed so it was kind of easy for me to catch him.


The final snake I caught was this Brown Snake. He too was in that freshly mowed field where the mouse was.


All in all I had a good visit to the camp in Earlham. Thought I would share these nice shots with you.

Various Snake Pics from 2007

I don't know the dates behind the following photos, I just know that these were all taken between spring and fall of 2007. There's not a ton of pics but a few different ones. Enjoy...
















You see a Brown Snake, a Three-Toed Box Turtle (our dearly departed "Church The Turtle"), and a Hog-nose Snake.

April 22, 2008

Today I had to get out of my office for a little while this afternoon. I went down to Banner and walked some of the trails. It didn't take long and I came across my first find. A Northern Water Snake. I was going to get a picture of him, but as I approached him, he slid off the branches he was perched in and went straight into the water. Here's a shot of where he was perched though...

A little bit later I came across this little guy...a Brown Snake.


Just a little farther down the trail and I heard a rustling that I thought might be a snake at first, but no, it was a male Painted Turtle. And believe it or not, not even thirty feet away there was an even larger female I found. Here's a couple of pictures of both of them...


Just a little more walking down the trail and then I come across my second Eastern Garter Snake sighting. The first one I didn't get a picture of, but the second one I got close enough to snap a couple good shots of. Here's one of him just trying to get away from me...

This short office escape was capped off when I got back in my car only to drive a little way and save this Brown Snake from certain death if I hadn't moved him from his spot in the road where he was warming himself. Check him out...
Well, next time I have to get out of my office, I'll bring my camera along and I'll put up another post. This is not something where I will post on a weekly basis, but I will have something up every two to three weeks. So keep checking back. Thanks!