cross country turtle/herp trip

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Kfen
Posts: 422
Joined: June 17th, 2010, 5:51 am
Location: CT

cross country turtle/herp trip

Post by Kfen »

“The Great American Turtle Chase”, that is the name we finally decided on calling this crazy trip I took back at the beginning of April. It was my friend Anthony’s idea to drive across the country trying to find as many turtle species along the way. The rough idea was to generally follow the path of Route 10, from Jacksonville FL, to Los Angeles CA. Oh, and we only had 8 days to do it. So basically a big turtle year condensed into a weeks time. I love herping, and I love road trips, so how could I say no? After disucssing the details, planning, and trying to scope out spots online and through friends on and off for the better part of a year, we convinced Anthony’s friend John to join us on our adventure. Early April finally arrived, we flew from the North East to Jacksonville and got our rental car, a trusty minivan to fit all of our stuff and 3 tall people for the next 8 days. While turtles were the focus, I am interested in all herps so don’t worry, there will be others shown.

The clock was going to be ticking this entire trip, so with no time to waste we got on the road and headed out. It just so happened some friends had set some traps the day before for a study of alligator snapping turtles at a location on the way to the first place we had planned on going. Of course we were going to stop by, but unfortunately they were done checking the traps by the time we arrived. They had an alligator snapping turtle that they were just waiting for the epoxy to dry that was affixing a transmitter to its shell. While my travel companions were excited to see it, it only fueled my desire to get out and start searching for things ourselves. I didn’t just fly 1200 miles and commit to drivng across the country to see a turtle in bucket. We did get our first in situ herps of the trip there, however. There were some anoles skittering about, and this Plain bellied watersnake was cruising the shallows.

ImagePXL_20240402_162249327 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Nerodia erythrogaster

Back on the road to our official first stop, one of Floridas beautiful clear water springs. Another friend from FL was meeting up with us for the first few days AND bringing some canoes for us to use. While waiting for him to arrive, we hiked in some upland habitat hoping for a gopher tortoise. Despite some great habitat with active burrows, we couldn’t find any out and about. Luckily while driving the park roads to get to the boat launch, there was one munching on some plants along the road edge.

Image20240402_153158 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Gopherus polyphemus

Once in the springs, it wasn’t long before we found our first turtles. Loggerhead musk turtles were common foraging around in the vegetation and sunken debris of the clear water

ImageIMG_3232 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Sternotherus minor

Suwannee river cooters are impressively large. They were out in force basking on most of the larger branches.

ImageIMG_3246 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Pseudemys (concinna) suwanniensis

The current in the spring was pretty strong. So we passed up an alligator basking off to the side without getting a great look. John and I decided to turn around and try and get closer to get a better look. While doing that someone else in our group yelled out a different kind of alligator… Alligator snapping turtle!! After a bunch of splashing, hooting and hollering, we were able to pull up this beast, definitely the highlight of the day, and possibly the entire trip.

ImageIMG_3339 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Macrochelys suwanniensis

We did eventually check back on that gator. I love seeing them in the wild

ImageIMG_3321 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Alligator mississippiensis

The spring was a fantastic start to the trip, but as late afternoon turned to evening, we needed to start heading west to keep our progress moving. If we were to make our flight in LA, we needed to make it 3-400 miles west everyday. Every chance we got, we took back roads heading in the right direction that looked like they could produce some herps. That first night remained warm after dark, unfortunately the only night of the trip that did, so a few snakes made their appearance. There were a couple DOR and alive but hit corn snakes along with a couple juvenile rat snakes

Image20240402_210651 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Pantherophis sp Im not sure if its supposed to be alleghaniensis, quadrivitattus, or something else.

And a garter snake

Image20240402_220352 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Thamnophis sirtalis

The next day the idea was to mosey our way through Apalachicola National Forest with the main target being the Gulf Coast box turtle and hopefully some of the upland snakes of the area. All day it was cool and rainy which we figured ,and proved out to be bad for snakes. But the rain did bring out a species we likely wouldn’t have seen in fair weather, the eastern mud turtle

Image20240403_105631 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Kinsternon subrubrum

Walking around some road side wetlands produced these cricket frogs. Im pretty sure these are southern crickets.

Image20240403_122307 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Image20240403_121834 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Acris gryllus

While on the subject of cricket frogs. We saw them in two other locations on the trip. Extreme west FL, and eastern Texas. If anyone has any suggestions as to which species and or ssp they are, Id love to hear. FIrst one from FL and second from Texas:

Image20240403_205043 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Acris sp from western FL

Image20240406_145339 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Acris sp from Texas

Back to the ANF and finally in the afternoon shortly before leaving the forest, and after a DOR in the morning we got our target alive. A male gulf coast box turtle that did not want to show his face.

ImageIMG_3446 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Terrapene (carolina) major

Late that afternoon after continuing west, the sun finally broke and we stopped off at a spot hoping for barbours maps. We saw them immediately from the parking lot. We did get in the water and paddled around, but couldn’t get anywhere near them. So the best photos were taken with a cell phone through a spotting scope right from where we parked. The scope became invaluable throughout the trip. It allowed us to ID, and get great looks at many species we wouldn’t be able to otherwise. Most of the basking turtle photos in this post are hand holding a cell phone up to the scope. If you like turtles, scopes are incredible. And dont let my blurry photos fool you, in person everything was crystal clear. This photo shows barbours, river cooters, and a Gulf coast spiny softshell

Image20240403_153408 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Graptemys barbouri, Pseudemys c. concinna, Apalone spinifera aspera

Slightly better look at a differet Barbour’s, with another river cooter

Image20240403_153652 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr

Any of the big headed map turtles were high on my list to see during this trip, so it was nice to knock out the first one immediately. I didn’t have to worry because our streak of checking off targets continued. We spent most of that night paddling around in a couple of locations in western FL and Alabama and turned up several awesome species. Several were juveniles including alabama redbellies, cumberland sliders, one black knobbed sawback, this intermediate musk turtle

Image20240403_202656 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Sternotherus intermedius

And this juvenile river cooter

Image20240403_221530 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Pseudemys c. concinna

This big girl was certainly not a juvenile. She was a beast

Image20240403_225446 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Graptemys ernstii

A few non chelonian herps were seen as well. One of the aforementioned cricket frogs and this brown water snake

Image20240403_224928 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Nerodia taxispilota

By the time we were done killing it finding turtles, there was only a couple hours before morning so it wasn’t worth getting a hotel and we decided to get a few hours sleep in the car in a walmart parking lot. Oh the things we do when there are herps to be found…
On to MS in the morning to try for some more map turtles and any other herps we could.
We were successful in seeing both Pascagoula and yellow blotched maps in the same area but between their wariness and me being new to taking photos through the scope, the couple of pics I have are terrible. We did score this marbled salamander.

Image20240404_131222 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Ambystoma opacum

And even better, another gulf coast box turtle. I found its total lack of pattern pretty interesting.

Image20240404_135920 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Terrapene (carolina) major

That afternoon was time to say goodbye to our FL friend and his boats. Without him and his generosity we would not have seen nearly as much as we did up until that point. Now we had a decision to make. Continue west along our route and stop in New Orleans for a little relaxation and some adult beverages, or head a couple of hours out of the way north to a park we had heard about for ringed and pearl river maps? We didn’t have the exact location, just the name of a park, and there was a very real chance we wouldn’t make it in time before the sun went down, and that we wouldn’t find a decent place to observe the river in a spot with basking sites. Well, this was a turtle trip so north we went as fast as we could! We arrived at the park in the very late afternoon/early evening and picked a spot that had parking as close to the river as possible. Parked the car and headed down a trail to get us to the river as fast as possible. This was the scene as we first saw the river. You can see our long shadows. We lucked out that we hit the right curve of the river that was treeless allowing the sun to still be shining on that spot.

Image20240404_184318 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr

And there on an exposed log was 2 ringed map turtles. We made the right decision.

Image20240404_183217 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Graptemys oculifera

To make some westerly progress quickly we finally got on route 10 for the first time. The next morning we attempted for some whooping cranes in western Louisiana where they are resident year round. It’s a large wildlife conservation area most of which is not accessible without a boat. So not surprisingly we struck out on those, but did see our first red eared sliders, actually in their native range. We ended up seeing 94 of them throughout Lousisiana, Texas, and unfortunately a few in California.

ImageIMG_0207 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Trachemys scripta elegans and Pseudemys concinna

We had plans to meet up with another friend in the Houston area that afternoon who was going to take us out for some early season road cruising. So after only a couple of hours poking around in southern Louisiana, it was time to make some tracks, the theme of the trip. We got to Houston with only a few hours before the temps dropped too low to be productive. So we wasted no time and hit some roads.

We were able to turn up a few snakes. First was a cottonmouth that quickly got off the road. That was followed by a ratsnake that despite being a very exciting find for me, I did not get any reasonable pics of. Here are a few snakes that I do have photos of:

Image20240405_192730 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Nerodia fasciata confluens

Image20240405_193949 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Storeria dekayi

And this Rough earth snake I flipped under some debris behind a gas station.

Image20240405_185153 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Virginia striatula

Not as many snakes as we would have liked, but successful regardless. What we did get a lot of was dust. I had the “brilliant” idea of driving with the back minivan doors open for a quick exit. Turns out that’s a terrible idea on dirt roads. Everything was covered.

Image20240406_074750 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr

Got a hotel early that night to catch up on some much needed rest and prepare for another jam packed day. Our texas friend was going to bring us around to several spots in eastern texas. First stop the next morning was to check some traps that some folks had put out for alligator snapping turtles. Would we really be able to see both species on ASTs on the same trip…no lol. No luck on Macrochelys temminickii but we did get a different ssp of softshell in hand than the ones we had previously seen. And it was a large female.

Image20240406_084713 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Apalone spinifera pallida

Next stop was to see mississippi map turtles in a suburban water body where our friend normally sees dozens basking. When we got there all we saw was a few red eared sliders. The low temps the night before likely made them late risers. We decided to wait them out and eat an early lunch at a restaurant overlooking the pond. Finally a few came out.

Image20240406_114627 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Image20240406_115334 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Graptemys pseudogeographica kohni

We also were able to tick off common snapping turtle and this common musk turtle at that spot.

Image20240406_111145 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Sternotherus odoratus

There were also a couple nice diamond back watersnakes
ImageIMG_0280 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Nerodia rhombifer

The next area was somewhat of a long shot, but we found the prettiest ornate box turtle I have ever seen, and the first one in the wild for me. There were flowers all around, I swear I didn’t pose it next to one on purpose.

Image20240406_143147 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Terrapene ornata

I was also able to get a picture of a cottonmouth since we missed out on the one we saw the night before.

Image20240406_144707 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Agkistrodon piscivorus

It was getting pretty late in the afternoon when we arrived at our last spot for central/eastern Texas. We were looking for texas cooters and Cagle’s maps. It did not disappoint. We saw both species but didn’t see any basking cooters, only coming to the surface. We got some good looks, but no pics. However the Cagle’s was probably the best scope pic of the trip.

ImagePXL_20240406_220441535~2 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Graptemys caglei

Our time in east Texas came to an end so we said goodbye to our gracious texas friend, another person who really helped us check off some species, and we hit the highway to cover some distance. We took Route 90 all the way to herper friendly Comstock Motel hoping for a snake or two along the way, but there was only one skirting off the road where it was still a heavily trafficed highway so by the time we pulled over and ran back it was long gone. We woke up in the next morning to some pretty chilly conditions. I think it had gotten down in to 40s that night and only made it into the 60s during our time through west Texas. Needless to say, the herps were not moving. So we hightailed it north into New Mexico for a western turtle species with a limited range. It didn’t take us long once we arrived in the area to hit our target, the Rio Grande cooter

Image20240407_151004 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Pseudemys gorzugi

At this point we had seen at least one new turtle species in every state along the way with just AZ and CA left. So we drove the rest of the way to the AZ border with 2 days left in the trip, one for each state. The cool temps followed us into AZ, but we gave it our all. We spent quite a while wading through some very cold water feeling around for sonoran mud turtles, and then hiking for several hours in a spot where I had seen several desert tortoises on a previous trip. Try as we might, it was not to be. Only a few common lizards were seen, and those not in the numbers Im used to when I have visited during the monsoon. Our last night we stayed on the AZ/CA border. We had 3 spots picked out in CA to hit that day before our flight left LAX that evening.

First up was Joshua tree to look for the other species of desert tortoise. But again, unseasonally cold temps didn’t help our cause. The scenery was cool, and we did see a lizard I had wanted to see for many years: the chuckwalla. This big male was out basking on a rock pile but quickly dove into the rocks before we could get any photos of him out. This crevice photo will have to do.

ImageIMG_0373 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Sauromalus ater

Next spot was a place Anthony had seen western pond turtles before. It was supposed to be just about guaranteed. By the time we got there temps seemed great, but there were none to be found. I was pretty disappointed as those were definitely high on my list. I didn’t have too long to feel sad because right at the end of our walk a California kingsnake crossed my path and put a huge smile on my face.

ImageIMG_4037 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Lampropeltis californiae

Our last stop of the trip was a unique spot where green sea turtles congregate. Im not really sure how to describe it other than where a culvert dumps into a freshwater river/stream. To make it even more bizarre is there were red eared sliders swimming alongside them. The sea turtles would only surface for a few seconds so I was never able to get a picture through the scope. So here is a terrible unaided cell phone photo.

Image20240409_162550 by Kevin Pollack, on Flickr
Chelonia mydas

That was the last stop. Our whirlwind trip covered 8 states in 8 days. We drove a total of 3200 miles. We managed to see close to 60 herp species (approx because there were some lizards and those cricket frogs that weren’t 100% identified), of which 25 were turtles, with 2 additional ssp. Prior to the start of the trip I had figured if we saw 13-15 turtle species we would have done well. With the help of a few friends we blew that number out of the water. It was incredible.
User avatar
Brian Hubbs
Posts: 4738
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 11:41 am
Location: "Buy My Books"-land

Re: cross country turtle/herp trip

Post by Brian Hubbs »

Nice trip. Too bad you didn't see a pond turtle, but that was a nice dotted/dashed cal king... :beer:
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