Saturday we checked our property and found a new for the year 38 inch speckled king and a few other smaller species.

Find of the day was the same red milk we have seen for three years. We didn't measure it since it was 19 inches late last Fall. It was in between the usual two piecies of tin that also has a few oak leaves between them. Every time we find this snake I think it may be the last!

Sunday we headed for the Kansas border around Joplin. Our goal was our first bull snake but after a full day of driving gravel roads on our way back we decided it must have been a little cool for snakes to be moving. We only found 3 racers on the roads. Another racer, 6 ringnecks, a western glass lizard, and a nice 24 inch red milk were our only snakes found on road cuts. We also found 11 great plains skinks and 12 collard lizards. Found very few DORS which was surprising.

Two quick stories,

Driving along we spotted a large racer apparently sunning itself on a large flat rock. I left our camcorder in the car and walked right up to the racer. I couldn't see the head and then I noticed a very wet garter snake writhing in the grass just inches from my foot. It was about 24 inches and was wet two thirds back with a open wound where the wetness ended. The racer took off and after a couple minutes the garter snake had apparently recovered from its very close call to almost being a meal.

We also spotted a male collard lizard that really had his colors. I filmed him and then he went under a rock with water under it. As I set me camcorder down a few feet away I lifted the rock so my son could try and get a pic with his new camera. Out popped a large female and the male headed for the camcorder and tried to hide on top of it under the carrying handle.It is one of the older full size ones. Guess he thought it was a black rock! The pic was taken rather quickly but he did get one. The lizard actually left water on the top of the camcorder! Definitely a strange encounter.