phostracks

I do believe I’ve hit the time to retire from the blogosphere. I’ve been doing this kind of thing (for the most part) since the late 1990s — back when each post was handcoded with html code. Heh. Truth is, I’m just tuckered out in my online life. Too many social networks, too many modes of communication, too much static, fuzz, and noise — while the real world keeps spinning and growing more…

The Dusky pigmy rattlesnake, a species we’ve seen a few times on phosTracks, is an absolutely adorable and ridiculously tiny viper. Sure, this is a venomous species. Yes, you should treat them with all due respect and caution. But come on! Look at that adorable little mug! Just look at that super-tiny rattle! Heh.

Anyhow, this Dusky was photographed along the edge of one of Merritt Island’s many, many waterside trails. A juvenile, I’m surprised we actually spotted the kid nestled just off the trail. Adults can grow upwards to maybe two feet in length, but this one still had a long, long way to go.

To learn more about Dusky pigmy rattlesnakes, check out Stetson University’s Pigmy Rattlesnake species profile page.

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Sistrurus miliarius barbouri, the Dusky pigmy rattlesnake; Brevard county, Florida (31 July 2016, Nikon D7100).

Gah! there are still so many lizard shots (and other stuff) to post from last month’s jaunt to south Florida, but I have to shift gears for a few clicks. I’m not sure it’s truly possible to focus too much on lizards, but if it is — I may be getting somewhere close to that vicinity. Sooo… let’s pause for a few clicks on the lizard-front and check out a number of snake shots I haven’t gotten around to posting just yet.

Kicking us off is an adorably young Peninsula ribbon snake, Thamnophis sauritus sackenii, photographed at Palm Island Park (Lake county, Florida) last month. I found the little lace o’ serpent hanging out in a palm adjacent to the lake shore and couldn’t help but to snag it for a few shots. I mean, look at that little fella. Can a little snake be any cuter?

Thamnophis sauritus sackenii, the Peninsula ribbon snake; Lake county, Florida (19 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Thamnophis sauritus sackenii, the Peninsula ribbon snake; Lake county, Florida (19 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Thamnophis sauritus sackenii, the Peninsula ribbon snake; Lake county, Florida (19 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Thamnophis sauritus sackenii, the Peninsula ribbon snake; Lake county, Florida (19 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

In the past few weeks, we’ve seen heaps of south Florida lizard photographs. Though we still have heaps more to come, lizards weren’t the only organisms Eric and I came across during our little sojourn around southeastern Florida. One precious little slice of a critter was this juvenile Everglades racer snake (Coluber constrictor paludicola).

The Everglades racer is a still-recognized subspecies of the Eastern racer. Throughout most of peninsular Florida, the Southern black racer (Coluber constrictor priapus) is the dominantly recognized subspecies. The two subspecies are extremely similar to one another in appearance, but the Everglades racer tends to be a bit grayer than the Southern black racer. That’s about the gist of it. Range is a decent indicator between the two (according to some), but the racers of coastal Brevard county (around the Merritt Island / Cape Canaveral area) are often recognized as being Everglades racers… which is strange. Brevard county is nowhere close to being in south Florida or the Florida Everglades. Heh.

I haven’t researched the scholarship differentiating these two subspecies. If the distinction is currently based on mere observable traits (such as color), I find myself wanting to doubt that subspecies distinction. Many species, snakes included, can feature wide ranging phenotypic variation. I mean, just look at our Florida banded watersnakes (Nerodia fasciata pictiventris)! Just because the snakes of one population are grayer than those of another doesn’t necessarily justify a subspecies distinction in my view. Still, as I said, I don’t really know the scholarship. Maybe there is a bonafide genetic distinction between them? Regardless, on phosTracks I only tag organisms to the species level. With so much movement and change in taxonomy, I just can’t keep up with the shifting sands of subspecies classifications!

As juveniles, both subspecies look quite different than their respective adult forms — as you can see in these images. As this snake continues to age, it’ll lose the blotchy patterns on its back and assume a more grayish dorsal tone.

Coluber constrictor paludicola, the Everglades racer (juvenile); Miami-Dade county, Florida (20 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Coluber constrictor paludicola, the Everglades racer (juvenile); Miami-Dade county, Florida (20 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Coluber constrictor paludicola, the Everglades racer (juvenile); Miami-Dade county, Florida (20 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Coluber constrictor paludicola, the Everglades racer (juvenile); Miami-Dade county, Florida (20 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Coluber constrictor paludicola, the Everglades racer (juvenile); Miami-Dade county, Florida (20 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Admittedly, it’s been a somewhat difficult week to focus on lizards, photography, and writing. I can barely keep up with the catastrophic, amateur-hour, hot-mess that calls itself the White House right now, and that’s putting it mildly. What a shit show of misery. I’m only now starting to find my sea legs in this maelstrom of governmental mayhem. Though I’m not particularly optimistic of the near future, I am feeling a bit more confident than I was a week ago. I know that I am not alone in these feelings, and this country clearly isn’t going to go down or forfeit its foundational values without a fight. I truly don’t think we’ve faced such an internal crisis since the American Civil War. These are strange days, indeed — and we’re all going to find out how resilient and durable our constitutional structure of federal government truly is. This is our test.

With that on the table, I suppose it’s time to dip our toes back into the pool of south Florida’s biodiversity. There’s still so, so much to share from our January run down south.

As we’ve seen in recent posts, Eric and I were able to find a healthy number of non-native anole species in South Florida — with the merciful grace and assistance of one James Stroud. I’m not sure I could pick a “favorite” species from the weekend’s excursion, but I was certainly impressed by the Largehead anoles (Anolis cybotes, one of which is featured on this post).

Think about it: This is a non-native species, native to Hispaniola (the Dominican Republic and Haiti), scratching out a living in an otherwise unfamiliar and somewhat cluttered ecological landscape. South Florida is jammed to the gills not only with homes, people,  box stores, and all such Americana, but also with non-native species fluttering, slithering, and scratching about everywhere. It’s an ecological free-for-all.

Some species, like the Cuban brown anole (Anolis sagrei), have adapted with remarkable veracity and success. Others, such as the Largehead anole featured on this post, are more limited in their success — existing in small, somewhat isolated population clusters here and there, hanging on and moving forward in limited pockets of habitat. There’s something impressive about that — the ability to persevere and move forward despite such obstacles. Anoles are remarkably resilient and tough organisms.

One of the things that fascinates me about South Florida is the fluidity of its biodiversity. In South Florida, ecological balance is erratic and forever shifting. There isn’t really any kind of stability; everything is defined by perpetual change. Of course, you could say the same for any square acre of North America (or the world) and you’d be right on the money, but in South Florida it’s a dramatic, exaggerated, and rapid-fire form of change and ecological shifting. In the world of lizards, for example, you’ll find Caribbean and African lizards duking it out for habitat dominance while the North American lizards scramble around the fray and adapt to their new competitors. Anything goes, and game of life is constantly changing.

In South Florida, the delusional myth of borders and barriers is clearly revealed and laid naked before all to see. This is the natural state of the world: fluid change and constant adaptation. In the real world, not the world of boneheaded bumpersticker politics, life doesn’t change backward. Life only moves forward. Change defines the natural state of life, and the organisms that adapt to real-world and environmental changes are the ones that earn their respective futures. The rest, those rigidly stuck in the past and/or unwilling or unable to adapt to the real world around us, quietly fade away.

Anolis cybotes, the Largehead anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis cybotes, the Largehead anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

To learn more about All-Things-Anolis, you should check out anoleannals.org. If you just want pictures and such, you can also filter and check out all currently-published phosTracks anole posts!

In this sad and miserable period of American History, a period dominated by narcissism, xenophobia, and the loss of rationality as an American virtue, I probably shouldn’t admit something like this, but here goes: When I see a Cuban Knight anole, whether in the flesh or on the screen, I often hear Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven in a Place on Earth” in my head.

It’s an odd association to make, I think, Cuban knight anoles and “Heaven is a Place on Earth.” Sure, I loved the track when it first came out back in 1987 or so, but what in blue blazes does this song have to do with the emerald green awesomeness of Anolis equestris?!?!? I just don’t know.

Maybe I listened to this song one particularly powerful day back in 1987 while drooling at a picture of a mythic Knight anole in one of my Florida reptile books (as I often did)… Whatever the reason, whatever the cause, rest assured “Heaven is a Place on Earth” is blaring in my head at Volume 11 right now. This was one most-excellent Knight anole.

This lizard was the first of two final Cuban knight anoles Eric and I came across on our final morning in south Florida. We were trolling about the edges of Florida City looking for chameleons before we had to head back north, back home. Ultimately, we weren’t able to track down any chameleons, but this jewel of a lizard manifested from the æther and presented us with a fine opportunity to do some wicked macro studies of its scale patterning.

I’m consistently and predictably bewildered by Knight anoles. This large non-native lizard is one of the “crown giants” of genus Anolis. Large, robust, fast, and strong, they can be rather tricky to catch up to. They can also bite rather hard in self defense.  They haven’t quite made it up to Volusia county, where I live, en masse just yet (though there are isolated reports), so I try to soak up as much equestris as I can whenever I hit south Florida. It’s a slight addiction. Sort of like Belinda Carlisle was back in 1987, I suppose.

Anyhow, I wanted to shoot some macro studies of an equestris and certainly had my chance with this one. Just check out those scales, all those greens, all that texture. What an amazingly rich, dynamic, and textured lizard, right? Sort of like “Heaven is a Place on Earth” still is, I suppose. Heh.

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis equestris, the Cuban knight anole; Miami-Dade county, Florida (22 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

In South Florida, we apparently have two species of so-called “Wall crab spiders”: Selenops insularis and Selenops submaculosus. After trolling about online and on bugguide.net, I believe these two individuals (one above, one below) are the former, S. insularis.

I’m not sure about this specific species, S. insularis, but some spiders of genus Selenops are known as base jumping spiders — meaning they are spiders that can jump and somewhat control their descent, “flying” or “gliding” to targeted trees and foliage, for example, rather than the open ground. That is, of course, incredibly and wickedly awesome. As for these two lovelies, they were tuckered behind a large outdoor projection screen in Everglades National Park. Rest assured, they were very much situated in their night-spots — and not gliding around the park. Heh.

If and when I can either confirm or correct this identification, I’ll update this post accordingly.

Selenops insularis, Wall crab spider; Miami-Dade county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Selenops insularis, Wall crab spider; Miami-Dade county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

A Variety of Organisms at Long Pine Key in the Florida Everglades, 21 March 2015 [Spring Break BioBlitz 2015]

Alligator mississippiensis, the American alligator Long Pine Key in Everglades National Park; Miami-Dade county, Florida; 21 March 2015 Featured on this post are a number of organisms I spotted in and near the pond at the Long Pine Key campground of Everglades National Park, Florida. As we saw in our last two posts, I spent some time during my last night in South Florida scouring the edges of the…

This past weekend, I ducked inland to spend the weekend with my parents in Mount Dora. It’s always a treat to visit my parents, of course, but I’ll freely admit that I love getting to Lake county for the reptiles too. I’m not sure there is a “bad” county in Florida to find snakes, but Lake county has always proven to be extra productive on the snake front. My parents grew up there, and we’ve had family in the area for as long as I can remember, so I’ve been visiting Lake county and its innumerable aquatic habitats my entire life.

On Sunday 17 May, I trekked down to Palm Island Park near downtown Mount Dora for a few hours. It’s a place I’ve written a lot about on both Dust Tracks and phosTracks. The park features a number of elevated boardwalk paths that trace the edge of Lake Dora. This is one of the few areas I know where you can somewhat-reliably find interior central Florida’s three “big” non-venomous watersnakes: the Brown watersnake (Nerodia taxispilota, featured on this post), the Florida banded watersnakes (Nerodia fasciata pictiventris), and the Florida green watersnake (Nerodia floridana). Over the years, population densities of these three species have shifted back and forth. Right now, Palm Island features a large number of both Brown and Florida green watersnakes; they Bandeds seem to have moved away from the boardwalk trail somewhat.

Upon arriving at Palm Island, I immediately found this beauty bunkered out on a concrete slab near the boardwalk trail entrance:

That, my friends, is a rather large and likely-gravid (pregnant) female watersnake. I’ve seen many Brown watersnakes on this slab piling over the years, as well as a number of Florida bandeds and even Yellow rat snakes (Pantherophis alleghaniensis). On this trip, however, the large female Brown had the slab all to herself.  Needless to say, I was quite gentle and careful with her for the photographs on this post.

A small crowd gathered while I worked with the snake on the boardwalk trail. As was the case with the Brown watersnake we visited in the Florida Everglades last month, the onlookers were quite cool. No shouts of terror, no demands to kill the snake, no flying sticks or rocks. Just questions of curiosity and lots of mobile phone pictures. One dude even knew exactly what kind of snake this was, a non-venomous Brown watersnake. It’s kind of sad that I’m so surprised when somebody actually knows what a watersnake species is and doesn’t simply assume it’s a cottonmouth. Heh.

I ended up snapping only the basic series of body angles I like to capture with each watersnake I come across. No fancy full-body shots or anything artsy. It was a rather hot and sunny day, and the temperature was a bit high for the pregnant snake to be exposed like that for very long. It didn’t take too long before I wanted to return the snake to her original nook, just to play it safe. No worries, though… As we’ll see in the next few posts, there was plenty of herp action that weekend — at both Palm Island Park and in my parents’ backyard!

Forgive me; this post is long. I’m working this stuff out through the act of writing…

So far, on our still-young phosTracks photoblog, we’ve seen a handful of Florida banded watersnakes, Nerodia fasciata pictiventris. This post presents the South Georgia representative of the species, the Southern banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata fasciata. That being said, the snake you see here probably isn’t a Southern banded watersnake. Also, yes it is. And why so? Because it probably isn’t. Confused yet? Welcome to my world.

I find myself quite skeptical of most subspecies designations. In many cases, such subspecies divisions were originally driven by archaic observations based on phenotypic, observable characteristics such as colors, size, weight, and so on. In a sense, this potentially disregards simple regional variations seen from population to population — or, actually, it makes too much of them. Is such regional variation enough to warrant an actual phylogenetic division within a species? Well, maybe. Or maybe not. And what is a “sub”species anyway?

Linnaean Classification of dogs, from cnx.org.

As DNA sampling and phylogenetic analysis continues to advance, we live in an era where taxonomic classification as we know it is undergoing a significant evolution of its own. I do indeed believe that the Linnaean world I grew up in, the one where we learned Kingdom-Phylum-Class-Order-Family-Genus-Species, is on its way out. Dating back to the 1750s, Linnaeus founded our modernistic notion of binomial nomenclature and the taxonomic schema I was taught when I was a kid. It was nifty. Everything fit into nice little boxes (as seen in the educational image to the right). As time progressed, however, we started adding strata to the system to accommodate increasingly-perceived complexities in the real world of organic life and evolutionary diversity. We started creating suborders, infraclasses, suprafamilies, and so on. It turned out the world was far more complicated than the Linnaean system was originally designed for.

Picture this: Imagine you’re put in charge of building a writing center for new, local college from the ground-up. You don’t really know how many students you’ll ultimately serve, and you certainly don’t know what kinds of assignments they’ll ultimately need help with. Looking around, you think you have a pretty good idea of what to expect, so you build your writing center as best you can. Once the doors open and students start coming in, however, you soon discover there are far more students than you anticipated, and these students have a wide-ranging orders of concern. Some need help with commas, other with organization. Some have difficulty navigating digital technologies, others have no sense of audience. Further, you realize that different courses and disciplines have radically different types of assignments, and different teachers have radically different measures of assessments, goals, and outcomes. In short, you realize that the writing center you built is not optimally designed to deal with all of these issues as they exist in the actual, real, and fluid world. So, you have a choice: Do you add on to the already-flawed writing center infrastructure? Or do you build a new system to better accommodate your students and their ever-changing needs?

That’s sort of the dilemma with Linnaean taxonomy. For decades, we’ve been adding on to that flawed, closed system, keeping those little boxes in place. There is, however, a move to create a more-fluid, more-open system of cladistics — one that focuses on taxa as clades, subsections of taxa not necessarily bound to the pre-existing strata-titles of the Kingdom-Phylum-Class-Order-Family-Genus-Species box system. Life is, after all, rather complicated and ever-changing, and complicated systems rarely function with easily-divisible binaries. Cladistics recognizes that everything is still happening. In a way, Linnaean classification is based on categorizing things into their little boxes, whereas cladistics is about better understanding evolutionary relationships and the movement of species through evolutionary history. In Linnnaean taxonomy, to think that a static system will serve radically different taxa —such as the insects and the mammals— equally is, come to think of it, absurd. It’s like having two shoeboxes and then trying to jam radically different balls equally into each box. A tennis ball is not a golf ball.  Anyhow, it is along these lines, the lines of the judicially nice and tidy boxes of Linnaean taxonomy, that my faith in subspecies designations begins to fall apart.

Cladogram of dogs from FractalFoundation.org.

Though it does sometimes occur, rarely are there natural borders that actually divide one subspecies from another (like, say, a massive river or a mountain range). Instead, you often end up with broad zones of intergradation — areas where two subspecies overlap and breed with one another. This is assuming that subspecies designations are valid divisions in the first place. Thinking about these “zones of intergradation” helps us keep and maintain our binary thinking with the subspecies: This is the Florida subspecies, and that is the Southern subspecies; it just so happens that sometimes they cross over. Sometimes they’re both.

But what if we just disregard that “subspecies” division altogether? What if we recognize that the phenotypic nature of species can range and “drift” not just in time but also in space? What if it’s not a matter of black and white, this vs. that? What if it’s all just shades of gray. This is why I’m attracted to cladistics/cladograms (seen in the insert to the right); it affords more value in the flowing of evolution history and diversity not just between species, but also within species, and it does so without trying to add labelled boxes onto the other labelled boxes. With cladograms, it’s easier to think of variation within species without feeling obligated to box and divide one subspecies from another.

So, that brings us to the banded watersnake we see here…

Nerodia fasciata is the recognized genus and species for the banded watersnake. In North America, we have three currently-recognized subspecies, two of which are in Florida and/or Georgia: The Florida banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata pictiventris, and the Southern banded watersnake, Nerodia fasciata fasciata. In peninsular Florida, the default is always N. f. pictiventris. In central Georgia, the default is always N. f. fasciata. But what about the border in between? What about the broad zone of intergradation in far north Florida and extreme south Georgia? Truly, the “line” between the two species is somewhat a myth when you step into that fluid zone of intergradation.

In their book, North American watersnakes: A natural history (2003), J. Whitfield Gibbons and Michael E. Dorcas describe in great detail the natural histories of each of North America’s watersnake species. Regarding the two banded watersnake subspecies at stake in this post, Gibbons and Dorcas draw from a 1938 article by William Clay and summarize the differences as follows:

“Nerodia f. fasciata have dark ventral markings that are square, and they usually have more than 128 ventral scales. in contrast, N. f. pictiventris have ‘elongate dark areas near the anterior margins of the ventrals’ and fewer than 128 ventral scales’ (Clay 1938b). Both of these subspecies vary extensively in color pattern, having red, brown, or black crossbones dorsally on a lighter-colored yellowish, gray, or reddish background. Large individuals of either subspecies may become melanistic, obscuring the banding pattern, which may be obscure even in some smaller individuals.”

Elsewhere, in the Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia (2008), Camp, Gibbons, and Elliot write, “Of the three known subspecies, only the southern banded watersnake (N. f. fasciata) is found throughout most of the species’ Georgia range. The Florida banded watersanke (N. f. pictiventris) may occur in extreme southeastern Georgia.” This is further supported in Snakes of the southeast (2005), also by Gibbons and Dorcas, in which the authors show the only overlap of N. f. pictiventris into Georgia to be the tiniest tip of its southeastern and coastal edges.

The snake featured on this post was photographed at Grand Bay Wildlife Management Area in Lowndes county, Georgia, just northeast of Valdosta and perhaps two dozen miles from the Florida-Georgia border (well away from the coast). Judging by the range maps and distribution comments provided in Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia and Snakes of the southeast, this should be Nerodia fasciata fasciata, the Southern banded watersnake. Color pattern differentiation is essentially worthless in my experience because both subspecies are so heavily variable, so I decided to count the ventral scales on the snake. According to the Clay system (noted above), if the sum total of ventral scales is under 128, it should be the Florida banded watersnake. If it’s over 128, it should be the Southern banded watersnake. And what was the final count for the snake featured here? The snake that, according to the range maps, should be the Southern banded watersnake? The final count was 126 — two clicks into the Florida banded watersnake range. Ah, shit.

Which was it? Southern banded watersnake? Florida banded watersnake? Clearly this was an intergrade of the two, as were all the other banded watersnakes I photographed and worked with during my two years in southern Georgia. I repeated my ventral count a number of times with different individuals and came up with varying numbers between 126 and 130, both within the Florida and Southern subspecies ventral-count ranges.

 So, yeah, the whole subspecies thing is a bit of a mess. So many of these subspecies divisions are based on fairly insignificant and erratic morphological differences between populations over space, but who’s to say that these physical differences necessitate such phylogenetic differentiation? After all, the Florida banded watersnakes of South Florida will likely continue to adapt differently than the Florida banded watersnakes of South Florida — as human development increases and as new, non-native species continue to arrive. In speciation and diversity, evolution never really shuts down. Adaptation doesn’t call it a day. A “species” as we know it today is simply another transitional form in the fluid flow of time and evolution. Perhaps general “subspecies” nomenclature can be helpful in that it helps us understand the general regionality of what we’re talking about, but I prefer to not think of it as black vs. white when it comes to subspecies. As far as I can tell, the differences between the Florida and the Southern banded watersnakes are negligible at best, and with such a broad zone of intergradation, we really are dealign with fifty-thousand shades of gray.

The act of writing this post has forced me to reconsider how I’m tagging and linking species on phosTracks. I’ve been using traditional and contemporary subspecies trinomials in both the posts and in the main species index on the right column of the main page. I’ll continue using subspecies trinomials within blog posts because that’s how so many of us are wired to think about these organisms, but I’m going to stick to the binomial (genus+species) model in the big species list on the right. For example, instead of having two entries in the big list, one for the Florida banded watersnake and one for the Southern banded watersnake, I’ll just have one single link for all Banded watersnake subspecies. That sounds like a decent compromise with myself. Heh.

phosTracks will be back in a few days. I want to retro-fix some metadata on the site in response to this post and then take a little bit of a breather!

Sources:

Gibbons, J. W., & Dorcas, M. E. (2004). North American watersnakes: A natural history. Norman: UP Oklahoma.

Jensen, J. B., Camp, C. D, Gibbons, W., & Elliot, M. J. (2008). Amphibians and reptiles of Georgia. Athens: UP Georgia.

Gibbons, W., & Dorcas, M. (2005). Snakes of the southeast. Athens: UP Georgia.

For my last night in south Florida, I camped at Long Pine Key in Everglades National Park. The campground is situated on the edge of a large pond. I’m not entirely positive, but the pond seemed to be a borrow pit — a pond  artificially created by pulling land from this area for use in other parts of the park. It wasn’t the picturesque pond you might imagine swimming in as a kid. Heh. Growth blanketed the shorelines, jagged limestone lined the edges, and the water had a bit of a stench to it. Still, being the Florida Everglades and all, I figured I’d find something down there… so I headed down with my headlamp and camera.

Wouldn’t you know it, within five minutes I found a young Florida banded watersnake (Nerodia fasciata pictiventris) trying miserably to disappear into a limestone crack. hashtag-winning, it really wasn’t a very good hiding spot. Not only was the snake easy to find, but it was also quite easy to catch the snake for closer study.

The Florida banded watersnake is a common, non-venomous watersnake found throughout much of peninsular Florida. Of the three “big” Nerodia species commonly found throughout Florida, the Florida banded watersnake is seemingly the most malleable when it comes to habitat preference. If there’s fresh or brackish water, you have a decent chance of finding a Florida banded watersnake — assuming there’s prey in the water to be found. As for this individual, it was leaning a bit on the thin side, but that’s not terribly surprising or concerning at the tail-end of winter and the dry season. No doubt, as spring thickens into summer, this snake will plumpen up in short order — unless, of course, it gets snagged by a predator. Hopefully it found a better hiding spot after our little encounter…? I sure hope so.

The Florida Banded Watersnake (Nerodia fasciata pictiventris), 19 March 2015 [Spring Break BioBlitz 2015]

Nerodia fasciata pictiventris, the Florida banded water snake Big Cypress National Preserve in Miami-Dade county, Florida; 19 March 2015 With the possible exception of some small and nasty species of scorpions, I’m pretty much a fan of all forms of wildlife. There’s hardly a species I come across that I don’t take a curiosity or liking to in one fashion or another. Still, there are clearly two…

So many lizards, so little time! Listen, I know that I’m posting a lot of lizard pictures right now, but come on… you have to admit they’re more than a little awesome. Right?

Here we have yet another Largehead anole, Anolis cybotes — a non-native species modestly established in a handful of small pockets of southeastern Florida since the 1960s or so. Among the many kick ass aspects of Anolis lizards is the dewlap, that tiny fold of colored skin under the jaw and neck. Different species of anoles feature differently shaped and colored dewlaps. In fact, sometimes the dewlap is one of the best ways to identify a specific anole. Some species can look terribly similar to others — until that dewlap pops out (if you’re lucky to catch such a display at the right moment). As for the Largehead anole, it’s fairly clear what this one’s dewlap looks like. He was showing it off in every way possible. He apparently wanted me to know this was his territory, by god, and I clearly needed to back off. Heh.

Anolis cybotes, the Largehead anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis cybotes, the Largehead anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Though native to the Central American region, the Brown basilisk, Basiliscus vittatus, is no stranger in south Florida these days. It was first recorded in South Florida during the 1970s and is now strongly established along the coastlines and canals of our southern reaches. This particular individual, a juvenile hanging out along a small, residential canal line, was one of two we found while tromping about Broward county in search of anoles.

Sometimes referred to as the “Jesus Lizard,” the Brown basilisk has the uncanny ability to run across water. This is one of its primary defense mechanics. They’re fast, agile, alert, and, good heavens, they can run on water! I’m always happy to see a Brown basilisk when I’m visiting south Florida.

Basiliscus vittatus, the Brown basilisk; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Basiliscus vittatus, the Brown basilisk; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Basiliscus vittatus, the Brown basilisk; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Basiliscus vittatus, the Brown basilisk; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Since we’re in a bit of an anole love fest right now, I think it’s worth our time to briefly consider the most successful of Florida’s non-native lizards: the Cuban brown anole, Anolis sagrei. The Cuban brown anole is a remarkably tough and adaptable little species of anole lizard. Since first working their way into south Florida during the late 1800s, the Cuban brown anole has steadily expanded and worked its way northward — even making it beyond Florida’s borders. A trunk-ground ecomorph, they’re small, stout, and robust lizards, ideally suited to sprinting and jumping their way around the ground and low-lying foliage.

When I was a kid, Cuban brown anoles were around, but they were somewhat uncommon. Nowadays, however, these little scampers are entirely dominant. I’m not sure a single day goes by in my neck of central Florida where and when I don’t see at least a dozen Cuban browns sprinting about the foliage. At this point, I don’t really even think of this species as “non-native.” They’re been here for a long time (relatively speaking), and they’re damn near ubiquitous!

Anolis sagrei, the Brown anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).

Anolis sagrei, the Brown anole; Broward county, Florida (21 January 2017, Nikon D7100).