Herping the pine barrens

Dedicated exclusively to field herping.

Moderator: Scott Waters

Post Reply
Creaturesgrtandsmll
Posts: 1
Joined: March 7th, 2021, 11:18 am

Herping the pine barrens

Post by Creaturesgrtandsmll »

I am planning a trip to the pine barrens NJ this summer and I've heard it's great herping, however the land to cover is absolutely massive! I have no idea where a good place to start there is. Just curious if anyone has any time spent herping there and if so any thoughts would be appreciated.
stlouisdude
Posts: 458
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 8:30 pm
Location: St Louis, MO / Hartford, CT

Re: Herping the pine barrens

Post by stlouisdude »

It's too far of a drive for me so I've never been. Hopefully someone PM'd you some suggestions.

If not, I can only offer the same advice I use everywhere I go.

Google search the various places of interest plus name of target species. Sometimes you may get lucky and get some specific advice or photos that way. I can give you a specific example, I was curious if timbers existed at a certain park and when I googled it sure enough someone had posted a photo of one while walking their dog. Very helpful to know if I was in the right area or not.

Go to google scholar and try the same thing there and you'll often find specific mentions there. Google earth over the areas and look for old homes, junk piles, or just likely places for snakes. Sometimes there will be a clearing surrounded by trees that may prove useful if there's junk or rocks there (speaking generally, I don't know anything about NJ other than you can't pump your own gas and it smells bad when I'm driving through there sometimes, must be low tide).


Drive around looking for anything unusual where someone might dump trash. Many times I've seen the remains of an old driveway and found junk pules. Once it was an old campground even. More recently I found an old house site that was from before the state took over the land and there was still some trash back there which proved useful.

Finally, half the fun is just getting out and looking and seeing what you can find.
Post Reply