Arizona Mountain Kingsnakes: The Beauty Called Pyromelana

Arizona Mountain Kingsnakes are labeled "pyromelana" by science. Lampropeltis pyromelana means "shiny-scaled fire-against-black". The name is about the best in the snake world and so is the appearance of this awesome snake.
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The best-looking milk snakes just aren't as pretty as pyros are. Even the beloved scarlet kingsnake is not painted quite as brilliantly as these mountain kings.

The amount of black and the triad (3 colors repeated) count varies greatly with pyros. One thing that is consistent is the red in pyros. Unlike the red in milk snakes, which varies greatly, the red in pyros is almost always the same, even in the albinos. The red in pyros comes as close to orange as possible without actually being orange.

Living in mountains that are covered with snow for a large part of the year and possessing such coloration, pyros really are a freak of nature.

This is a captive bred pyro that has some staggered triads or "zipper".

The coolest pyros available from 12 different locations can found at http://www.ophidiarium.com/

Great natural camouflage:

Mexican mountain kings are a pyromelana subspecies labeled knoblochi. They typically have nearly twice the triads as Arizona mountain kings and also the white bands connect at the bottom in a chain-link pattern. They are just a different kind of awesome and are just as available in the pet trade as pyros are. This is my captive bred knoblochi:

Stumbling upon a knoblochi or pyro is about the height of field herping, but take only photos.

If your snake collection consists of only one snake and that snake is a pyro, your collection is still complete.

Garter Snakes

It is November and the fields around here are still very active with garters. There are also plenty smashed in the road as the blacktop lures them with warm temps. These are the first snakes that are seen around here in the spring, along with racers. They seem to thrive with a short hibernation period.

This close shot shows how the garters scales are "keeled", that is to say that there is a raised ridge running down the middle of the scales like the keel on a boat.

Most of these garters have battle wounds from cats or other animals. I'm not one for numbers, but I think if we were trying to go for garter numbers we could probably round up 50-100 of these in a day.

Snakes and Parenting

After getting a pet snake a while back, the snake was brought home and placed in a typical display tank. The top on this tank was not the sliding type, but it fastened shut in another way. I was excited. My son was also excited and he had held the little snake for some time when I brought it home. The next day my son showed the snake off to one of his friends and afterwards the top of the tank was not secured properly and the snake escaped. When I found out that the snake was gone I was angry. The more I looked for the snake, the angrier I became. My son apologized for what had happened, but I was stern with him and didn't immediately accept his apology. At that point I guess I was acting more childish than he was. The snake was eventually found, but that really didn't matter.

I learned that what matters most to me is being a good parent . It is important for a child to be the most important thing in a parent's life and that they know it. When a parent causes a child to feel less important than a pet, a hobby, or anything else, that is clear communication to the child. Also, spending more time with an interest than with one's own child can cause this. I believe that when a child receives this communication, it can only be overcome with consistent and improved actions by the parent, because words mean so much less at that point. Looking back on this situation, I learned that if I fail to give adequate instructions to my kid, the consequences are not my kid's fault. The fault is my own. Parents should never punish their kids for things that they haven't been adequately instructed on. Only bosses can get away with that. A good parent is willing to discard an interest or even a career that makes their child feel unimportant.

Leopard Frogs

Next to snakes, frogs and other amphibians are some of the coolest creatures on the planet. They are cooler than most people in my opinion. Frogs are also thought to be good indicators of environmental conditions because they cannot tolerate very much pollution in the water. Leopard frogs are very common in the southern United States, but not all that common in the north.

These leopard frogs were found in a crystal-clear pool at about 7,000 feet elevation. The water was so cold that my hands went numb in just seconds when reaching for frogs.

Some more shots of frogs:

We thought this was the mama frog because it was the biggest frog at the pool. It croaked loudly when picked up, so it had to be a male.

These frogs by law are controlled for collection, so I only grabbed about 30 of them to sell in the classifieds. Just kidding.

Kids' Bug Collection

It is always good to start the day out with scenery like this:
These standing rocks looked like creek bed guardians:

We found that mormon crickets eat grasshoppers. I meant to get a picture of that, but didn't.

There were hundreds of mormon crickets all over. Here are 3 more:

This is a borer beetle. Non-native borer beetles are destroying many forests in Utah and there doesn't seem to be a good solution to the problem.

This is a robber fly. They sound like WWII airplanes when they fly. Robber flies prey upon other flying insects including honey bees, which they catch in the air and inject with venom. They then suck out the insides like a spider. These look like they might be a young dragonfly, but they are not related to dragonflies. They actually eat adult dragonflies that are much larger than themselves. There is another robber fly photo coming up in this post that looks like a bee, but is just a common variation.

These scorpions are common to Utah's deserts:

The beautiful markings of a dragon fly:

Another dragonfly that has a great wing color (I put the dragonfly against white to make the color pop out):

Dragonflies are not actually flies.

Tiger swallowtail:

Wounded dragon. Sometimes this happens when the kids try to catch these guys.

A young buck that seemed to have very little fear of people:

Thermoregulating sage lizard:

Side-blotched lizard keeping an eye on us:

I took these pictures as an afterthought. I was looking for snakes and my son was looking for bugs.

Cabbage white butterfly. These never stay still.

Pulling back some bark revealed ant tunnels:

The ants quickly began moving the eggs to safety:

Is this a bee? No, it is another robber fly.

The robber fly landed near the ants and I wondered if it would eat one.

The pattern of this rocky mountain parnassian butterfly cannot be seen until it is caught and held still. When it flies it simply looks tan.

A parnassian that is ready to get back to the flowers of the meadow:

A beautiful piece of living art:

With some silver underneath:

A tiger swallow tail that was lacking it's swallow tails. Though it had a tear on one of the rear wings, it appeared that the swallow tails were not ever formed:

A front shot showed some blue near where the wing tails should be:

This one was smaller, but had it's wing tails and was in perfect shape:

The diversity of butterfly colors and patterns is incredible. I think that a person could study butterflies their entire life and still require a field guide for complete identification.

This one had white on the wing's edges:

A shot from the bottom. Crazy eyes:

This little guy had a spectacular pattern when its wings were open, but it wouldn't cooperate for a picture of that.Another variation of the cabbage white butterfly:

White admiral butterfly:

The wings were showing some wear:

Box elder bug hangout:

If anyone can identify the above and below plants, please do so in the comments.

Another white admiral:

A mushroom cookie growing out of a log:

Some red under the tattered white admiral's wings:

A white admiral with less mileage:

Some really large slugs were found out in the morning moisture. These were huge & spotted:

Corn Snake Genetics

This corn snake belongs to a friend of the family:
As you can see, this corn snake is quite a bit different than any of mine. It has a broken up stripe that connects the pattern in the middle and towards the tail:

The variations in corn snake genetics are incredible. This snake is also high white and is very tame, like a typical corn.

To see an awesome variety and latest corn snake morphs, check out http://www.moreptiles.com/

Ruby is an entirely different flavor:

Lizard ID Challenge

Test your lizard id skills. What species is this and where does it range?

Whip snake, whiptails, scorpions, and others

****DOUBLE CLICK ON ANY PHOTO TO ENLARGE****
After finding a huge golden eagle and a lot of other cool desert wildlife, we arrived at a spot that looked good for finding snakes. This little whiptail was the first herp that I could get a picture of:
In less than 5 minutes we had found several scorpions. They are all curled up when you first flip the rock they are under:

They quickly spring into defensive posture:

They will nearly flip over thrusting their stinger toward you:

A true desert survivor could remove the stinger and pop the scorpion into their mouth for a snack. I prefer to just hold out until I can get to an Arby's.

These little guys seemed to have very good sight for having tiny eyes.

This was the largest of the scorpions and it had black claws:

It was not to be messed with. I put all of the scorpion homes/rocks back exactly as I found them.

We spotted a lot of side blotched lizards basking on rocks:

Another side blotched lizard:

This area had a concentrated population of whiptail lizards.

Most of these whiptails had some blue above their front legs.

The full-grown whiptails were 15 to 20 inches long from their snout to the end of their tails.

While being pursued they would often stop to lay for a moment on warm rocks and then take off again.

When they bask, whiptails usually lift their legs:

Photographing whiptails usually involves some running and chasing.

There were a lot of holes in the area, but the whiptails were reluctant to go down them when they were being pursued. This gave me hopes of finding snakes.

Another whiptail that is probably wondering why I am chasing it with a camera:

The pronghorn antelope: the fastest land animal in the western hemisphere.

Finally, a snake:

When we walked up to this rock slide, this striped whip snake came quickly slithering out.

Every whip snake I have ever picked up has rolled in my hands. Those that have handled whip snakes know what I mean by that.

Whip snakes are good-looking creatures:

Off goes the whip snake:

To terrorize the lizards.

This yellow side-blotched lizard was regrowing it's tail, possibly lost to the whip snake as it was found in the exact same area.

This fence lizard couldn't find a fence to hang out on:

These lizards are about the easiest lizards to catch. The are quick, but they let you get really close before they decide to flee.

Same lizard, different angle:

Blue and orange:

The orange is mostly in the arm pits:

A closer shot of the arm pit:

Unlike most, this lizard would not go to sleep when we turned it over and rubbed it's belly:

Another side-blotched:

Another big fence lizard:

The camouflage wasn't working with this guy:

After looking for cool rocks and finding more than we could take home, we photoed more of the whiptails while looking for snakes.

There were so many whiptails here that I had to stop several times to avoid running them over. The whiptails were also chasing each other around in circles, which made us laugh.

The smaller lizards lived right amongst the whiptails.

Whiptail lizards never bite when caught. Their defense is their speed.

As cool as whiptails are, they should not be kept as pets. There are just too many captive bred lizards that can be purchased cheaply and are easier to keep.

The kids like holding whiptails when we find them:

I have never seen a whiptail's tail detach like other lizards. Maybe they don't.

I think I took too many whiptail pictures. I guess that is what happens when only one snake is found.

Spiders and Creepy Crawlies.

Sometimes it is fun to turn attention to things that have a few more legs than snakes. Take a look at this caterpillar. This pattern would look awesome on a snake:
When this caterpillar was not crawling, it was hard to tell which end was which because of the eyes on the rear:

This was a ladybug hotel:

This is one of the easiest spiders to identify. Black widows were very common in the area we were flipping. Whenever I reached under a rock and felt a really strong web, I stopped and found another handle.

Another black widow:

And another:

This was a surprise:

This wolf spider was even bigger than the one from the previous spider post and had a huge egg sack.

The spider allowed me to move it to a better place for photos.

This shot is from almost directly behind the spider. They really do have eyes in the back of their heads:

Spider and caterpillar:

This spider was nearly 4 inches in length.

This thing had eyes all over. Even its abdomen had a pair:

Nightsnake neighborhood

I snapped a sequence of photos that showed this spider attack. These funnel-shaped webs were everywhere in the area and there were also countless grasshoppers flying in every direction. This grasshopper landed in the funnel-shaped web and as it struggled, the spider came running out and captured it.
The funnel web is a grasshopper's worst nightmare:
This shot shows the spider lifting it's fangs in preparation for the kill:

Death crawls closer:

After observing the funnel-web assault, I began flipping rocks on the same hill and found 2 night snakes. I took quite a few photos of those.

This night snake actually flattened it's head and made a small hiss when I lifted its rock. This is something I didn't think I would ever see a little night snake do. It is shown here still puffed:

These are Utah's state flower: the sego lily. They hint at how small the night snakes were:

A larger shot of the same type of flower:

A nocturnal snake that had to endure the sun and a few photos:

My son wanted to keep this one:

I have to admit that night snakes are pretty cool, especially their eyes, but the answer was no.
We found a basking fence lizard:

I didn't attempt to catch this one.

We saw sage lizards by the millions and I took pictures of some:

As common and colorless as sage lizards are, they are quite cool in my opinion:

Lizards always keep an eye on intruders:

I wonder how agile these guys would be without the claw footwear.

Sage and side-blotched lizards were found on the same logs. They apparently get along fine.

This side-blotched lizard was extremely good-looking with a blue leopard pattern:

We found quite a few of these mormon crickets while flipping:

The females have pointy things on their rear ends for laying eggs:

The males lack those:

Another female:

I had to photo this bumble bee on a thistle:

We found some skinks:

Skinks are just shiny, fast lizards.
These are the lampropeltis (shiny scaled) of the lizard kingdom:
This one was a biter, but I couldn't get a focused picture of that.

We found this one with a blue tail. The blue tail indicates a juvenile, even though this one was about the same size. The predator is supposed to go for the colorful tail, which easily breaks off and allows the skink to escape. We managed to let him keep his tail.

Stay still!

I managed to get one clean shot of this lightning bolt without holding it:

My son carried this gopher snake with him for over 3 hours while we herped:

I think if my son had more hands, he would carry more reptiles:

This was a cool thing to see:

A wild gopher snake feeding on a mouse. Who needs the discovery channel?

The eyes began to bug from pressure:

I am glad my Mexican black king snake doesn't require live food any more.

After his meal, the gopher snake was in a really bad mood and didn't want to be handled:

He did some hissing and striking and we let him be on his way.

This was a garter found the evening before this outing:

And another garter found near home the same day:

Snake Photography

We found this really nice gopher snake and I took a bunch of pictures of it. The snake was found while flipping and hissed and struck at anything that came near it. It bit my pantleg and then a few moments later was calm enough for kids to hold. It actually seemed to like being held after all the fuss:
The color pattern near the tail on gopher snakes is the coolest:

Utah wouldn't be as cool without Great Basin gopher snakes.

Swerve or stop when you see one of these on the road:

This snake was about 3.5 feet long. It can grow to over 6 feet.

I think it was trying to spell something:

Keep an eye on the head:

All of the pictures in this post are of the same gopher snake

This is the snake when it was all riled up:

Male and female mormon crickets:Female:

The beauty created by storms:

Rain coming to the desert:

The mountains are our compass:

A young mormon racer found the same day:

Racers don't race when they are cold.

This snake was only about 13 inches long.

This photo gives more size details:

One with the tongue out:

Killdeer Rescue. Sorry, no snakes in this post.

After a hail storm the other day, we witnessed a hopeless situation as 2 killdeer parents had attempted to move their chicks. For those that don't know, killdeers are really pretty birds that are closely related to plovers. They fly very well, but nest on the ground, relying heavily on camouflage. Killdeer eggs are even colored to match the rocks where they're laid. Anyway, the chicks were stuck on the road because of the high curbs on each side. It wouldn't be long before the chicks were either hit by a car or eaten by a cat or dog. They needed help. My wife looked at me and pleaded with me not to get involved because we were in a hurry as usual. She knows me better than that. I first helped the larger chick over the curb and it ran quickly to some tall grass. The smaller chick was wet and seemed very weak. While I began to help the

smaller chick over the curb, both of the killdeer parents would come close to me and fake an injury by flopping all over the ground as if their wings were broken. This is just their instinctive behavior to draw predators away and is entertaining to witness. The smaller chick didn't run to the tall grass and was almost too weak to stand. In the confusion, one of the parents flew to the smaller chick and started pecking at it. I intervened and walked up to the chick and picked it up. As I walked back, I could tell my wife was completely thrilled that we were now going to adopt another animal. I quickly did some research on raising killdeer chicks and found out that it is impossible to do. Besides being against the law, even killdeer experts cannot raise killdeer chicks. This is because killdeer parents never feed their chicks. From the moment they hatch, killdeer chicks have to find their own food. They must learn how to find food by watching and learning from their parents. After learning this, I dried off the smaller chick and quickly ran it back to the area thinking that I might have sealed this poor chick's fate. I was relieved to hear the chick calling loudly back to the parents and they flew up to me and faked injuries again. I set the chick at the edge of the tall grass where the larger chick had gone and then I withdrew. One of the killdeer parents then flew up to the chick and I feared that the parent would again peck the chick, but the parent led the chick into the tall grass to safety. That was really good to see. It was a good feeling to think we helped this bird family.

Snakes, lizards, and grasshoppers

On this warm morning I decided to head to a spot where gopher snakes and rattle snakes are sometimes found by the dozens. We started finding gopher snakes before we even got half way there. I'm not sure how many gopher snakes we found, but this was the first live gopher snake. It was calmer than most pet snakes and was a little over 4 feet long:
Another shot of the first snake since I had my camera out:
Snakes are so much easier to find when they are stretched out across the road:
Going:
Going:
Gone:
This was the only snake found in the shade this morning:
Me in my preferred habitat and the snake from the shade:
This shot shows rattlesnake vs. road machinery. I actually waved to the guy that was operating the road grader as I drove past, but I wasn't thinking kind thoughts. He had gone out of his way and off the road to accomplish this:These are large grasshoppers that my kids asked me to catch. Try getting 2 grasshoppers to stay still for a photo.

This dark-colored fence lizard was found. This is about as big as a western fence lizard gets:

More shots of the same lizard as I chased it around the rock formations. The .22 shell in the background gives some perspective as to the size of this guy. Because of its size and color, I think it is the same lizard that I have caught here the last several years.

Pretty lichens and cool reptile:

I had to get a belly shot after putting the old lizard down for a nap:

This smaller adult gopher snake was found on the way back. We were late getting back, but I had to stop and get the snake out of the road and into another basking spot.

Snakes: Handling Racers

In an area near an abandoned town off HWY 89, there is a lot of short grass and some debris on a SW facing hillside. This is known good habitat for many different snakes, but so far this year only racers have been found there. Whenever you come upon a basking racer, they don't waste any time fleeing; hence the term racer. To get photos of a warm racer, you must be quick to grab the tail:
Be ready for the immediate backlash:
A racer bite isn't any worse than getting snagged on a thorn bush.After grabbing and releasing the tail several times, the racer will then stand its ground. This is when you can take pictures if you care to.

Considered to be trash snakes by some herpers, I find racers to be really good looking snakes and definitely better than finding nothing when I am looking during the day.