Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru Aug

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Jeremy Westerman
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Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru Aug

Post by Jeremy Westerman »

I was approached by a DWR field Technician to help survey herps on the Camp Williams military property in the Oquirrh mountains. This is a huge off limits area that has very few records because of limited access. They are recording all herp species data but specifically targeting Utah sensitive species such as the milk snake. This survey runs until the end of August. Naturally I thought of a few of you guys... if you are interested in getting together for an official outing or several trips in an area usually way out of bounds to private citizens, chime in right away so we can get the necessary clearance and make it happen. Looking for seasoned pros who have accurate field I.D. skills, know a thing or two about habitat preference and behavior, aren't afraid of hiking, cactus or bad road road cruising...the more eyes in the field the better.
The tech has tried drift nets, pit traps and road cruising with minimal success, let's see if we can boost his numbers a little or quite a bit with some finds. I know the timing sucks for a survey in the heat of the summer but it is what we got available.
The ghost of the Kennicott milk survey from a few years back that fell through I suppose.

If you are interested feel free to get the message out to a few good guys (or gals) I know not many bother to look regularly or very often here, so if you have phone numbers use them.

I was thinking Mark Hazel, Brian Eager, Jimi Gragg, Rye Jones, Chris York and any other Salt Lake/Provo area locals would be interested, if I don't know you and you would still like to throw your hat in the ring that's cool as long as you walk the walk as well as you talk the talk.
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Rancorrye
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Re: Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru

Post by Rancorrye »

I'm interested. Let me know the dates and I'll try to make it work.

Rye
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Jeremy Westerman
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Re: Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru

Post by Jeremy Westerman »

first outing is going to be this coming monday afternoon at 4pm into the evening
Desert scorps
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Re: Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru

Post by Desert scorps »

I dont know much about snakes but collecting P. Boreus and several other types of scorps would be fun :P if I went could I even do that?
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Jeremy Westerman
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Re: Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru

Post by Jeremy Westerman »

A few interesting critters were seen yesterday
deer, cottontails, Jackrabbits, a coyote, shrews, voles, deer mice, a cooper's hawk, American Gold finch, solpugids, scorpions (sorry no Paruroctonus boreus just Anuroctonus phaiodactylus), coleopterids,
and of course a few herps
Mountain Short Horned Lizard (Phrynosoma hernandesi hernandesi)
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Northern Sagebrush Lizard (Sceloporus graciosus graciosus)
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Western Yellow-bellied Racer (Coluber constrictor mormon)
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Great Basin Gopher Snake (Pituophis catenifer deserticola)
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The wildlife tech inadvertently put one of his driftline locales right on top of a Burrowing Scorpion "dusky clawed scorpion" (Anuroctonus phaiodactylus) colony so they were the predominant bycatch
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dusky claw scorpion burrow
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but you have to be careful out there, after all this is a military testing range
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Bpete
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Re: Herpetological survey Camp Williams, Salt Lake Utah thru

Post by Bpete »

Very nice area, I spent some time around there when I was a kid Dove hunting with my dad. apparently it was not off limits then. I do remember seeing shells and such littering the ground.

Brian
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