You Never Know What You Will See
Sam and I were out for our normal walk this morning and I saw this. This photo was taken from about waist high and is pretty much what I see. What do you see?
Oh, really? Right there in the red box is a Horned Toad. A fairly common small lizard around here.
I knew he was dead because he didn't scurry away before I got there.
He died standing and on the lookout. It's almost for certain that a sidewinder got him, but I couldn't see any marks on him. I'm guessing that he moved just far enough that the snake lost him and couldn't find him to eat. I touched him and rigor hadn't set in yet, it was a quite recent death.
Can you see the Sidewinder? I upped the contrast on this one so you have a chance of seeing what I see. Take a look at the next frame and I'll point out some things.
You can see a few tracks indicated by the arrows and where they stop in the box is a sidewinder in hunting mode. Coiled and sunk down in the sand. They actually vibrate their whole body to sink down into the sand sometimes with noting showing above ground but their eyes. Pretty hard to see them, it is way in your best interest to pay attention on the desert.
All these sidewinder pictures are a year old. I haven't said much, but the sidewinder population is WAY down this year for unknown reasons. I suppose it could be Covid 19 because I have hardly seen any tracks all year and they normally come out of their burrows in March. 2020 has been a bad year for sidewinders in my part of the world too.
See the snake? You know what to look for now.
Here is a crop of the same photo. The snake is right in the center of the frame.
I have good news for the ecology of the desert. I saw at least 6 sets of sidewinder tracks this morning on our walk. 4 adult snakes, a juvenile and a baby less than 6 inches long. Looks to me like they are going to come back just fine.
All words and photos in this post are mine. For better or worse. Photos of the snakes taken with Iphone 6plus and the pictures of the Horned Toad with an Apple SE.
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Amazing that you can deduct the events from tracks on the ground! Useful skill for anyone close to a desert and also generally a fun one to have! :)
The snake looks kinda cute and cuddly! I'm sure you'd advise me not to try petting one though.
Tracking was considered a skill when I was growing up. I was always curious so I learned what tracks I was seeing and soon learned to tell how fresh they were. I guess I've been doing it all my life.
Sidewinders are not particularly venomous. A full jolt from an adult female (the biggest ones) will not kill a man. It will make you wish you were doing something else at the time. We do have some Mohave Greens in the neighborhood that are incredibly potent, they use venom and a nerve agent.
I wouldn't recommend petting, but I do like to see an occasional sidewinder. Sam has had several training sessions with them and he seems to know to leave them alone. Sidewinders will generally only bite what they can eat, so they are pretty polite about the whole deal.
I see! That does make my impression on them a bit brighter but I wouldn't try petting them anyway. Snakes are beautiful, and most of them are harmless, but I'm rightfully afraid of them. Perhaps my ancestral genes are at work.
I didn't realize before it's a rattlesnake species (and with horns no less!), makes sense to me now — when you were saying they shake and sink into the sand. I think I've seen other rattlesnakes do that too on Natgeo or discovery.
Sidewinders really like the sand. Most of the diamondbacks around here are in the 'harder' rock desert as are most of the Mohave Greens. Rattlesnakes all, but different ranges.
!ENGAGE 20
ENGAGEtokens.!Engage 20
I'm so afraid with a snake. My friend here in hive killed a snake yesterday, a very long and big snake.
All the venomous snakes here in Arizona are protected species, but that doesn't mean they don't have 'mysterious disappearances' when they get in a populated area. Game and Fish has a couple of experts on staff and will come remove them for you.
I'm not afraid of them but I'm not a real big fan, either.
Thanks for stopping by. I appreciate it!
!ENGAGE 20
ENGAGEtokens.Snakes give me the heebie jeebies man...Seriously. Funny for a country-raised lad from a country that has so many of the buggers. I like this post though man...Kind of informative although I had look up sidewinder.
Interesting little critters.
Hmmmmm. They called it him, but I think that's a mama snake. Only the females that have had babies (they are live birth reptiles) get that width (and length).
They are pretty polite from the bite standpoint. They rarely strike anything that they can't eat and have a larger % of 'empty' bites on humans than the diamondbacks or Mohave Greens. Means they don't inject venom.
I've got a couple of videos of snakes moving, but I'm the worlds shittiest video editor so nobody's ever seen them :)
I thought it was interesting how they move, nothing we have does that. Nature is wondrous really, the way everything seems to work out...Except when humans fuck it up.
Yeah. Believe it or not, this really started out to be a rant about the dickheads in the desert and I bailed to the snakes :) You can pretty well bet I'll get to the dickheads...
The sidewinder movement is an evolution based on hot sand. They get their entire body off of it every stroke.
Desert dickheads, city dickheads, work dick heads, outback dickeads...Everywhere dickheads. Seems dickhead is the new black these days. I'll look out for your post.
It took me a while to find this video, but you really need to see this @galenkp. I have photographic proof that the rat doesn't always get away...That's pretty cool. I always marvel at how well they film these things. Thanks for the video.
You know, I was once in a situation where I had to administer a few kicks myself...I could have done with kangaroo rat skills at that point but had to make G-dog skills work as best they could. It worked out although I didn't look quite as cool as that rat! :)
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ENGAGEtokens.Ya, I don't like wild snakes at all. I would probably try and get a shovel to chop that thing in half. That last thing I would want to see while walking my dog is a sidewinder.
!ENGAGE 20
Sidewinders are pretty cool, just give them a little space and they won't bother you. Diamondbacks can be cranky at times, and the Mohave Green is just plain nasty. The Greens are just arriving to my part of the world, and I keep Sam strictly away from their area.
Sam and I have had several really good training sessions with sidewinders-he avoids them really well (at least so far. I have nightmares with a snake hanging off his nose).
!ENGAGE 20
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They can stay down there as far as I am concerned. I really can't stand snakes. I find them fascinating, but I can't stand them.
I would have guessed the horned toad had been run over by a car. It looked like tire tracks to me.
It died during the dark on tire tracks. Quads and Side by Sides use the trails every day.
Rolling Stone re released "the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time" this morning. Should be room for some interesting discussion! 2003 was the last one...
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-albums-of-all-time-1062063/roxy-music-for-your-pleasure-2-1062882/
Oh, nice find. I will definitely be checking that out today! Gotta write my post about the Lions whopping the Cardinals first! :)
Basically an ugly football game from my perspective. Matthew Stafford for MVP?
It was pretty horrible. Stafford could have won a Superbowl by now if he had a team to support him. Whenever we had good offensive pieces he never had a line that could protect him long enough to take advantage of them. That and the officials doing their best to stop us at every chance.
ENGAGEtokens.I guess I need to study this in detail and learn to read the tracks as we look to move to the southwest area of Texas. We have copper heads and corral snakes here as well as water moccasins for the dangerous snakes.
I have no real experience with the desert but looking forward to learning.
Keep up the great work,
Sult