I see a lot of herons and egrets in the Rice Creek Chain. Nothing like what I saw on a section of the Rum River north of Milaca. I could hear a lot of chatter long before I got to this area. I rounded a bend in the river and came across the largest Heron rookery I’d ever seen. At least 500 plus nests in trees with a huge number of juveniles in the nests. I probably should have fished that stretch because if that many herons nested there it must support a lot of fish. I was more concerned with disturbing them and moving through quietly.
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Snakes, I find them fascinating and not frightening. I grew up In South FL and have lived in the northern half of the peninsula. I spent much time in the woods, swamps, rivers, ocean, and gulf. Have firsthand experience with all the native eastern poisonous snakes. My son in law is a herpetologist. He helped to put the first radio transmitters in the Phytons in the Everglades.
Wading in swamps I have seen numerous Cottonmouths. I have never had one approach me. I have also seen Canebrake rattlers even stood beside one before ever seeing it. In the Pine flatwoods I have seen many Pygmy rattlers, and Eastern Diamondbacks. The first rarely get much bigger than 2 feet long. The largest Diamondbacks I have seen were about 8 feet long. I have seen several Coral Snakes the largest was almost 3 feet long. I have also caught a number of Indigo Snakes they were all 6 to 7 feet long and never tried to bite. a really wonderful snake. I have handled all kinds of nonpoisonous snakes.
Most of the water snakes will bite. Infection not poisoning is the worst thing to come from it. I have been bitten often enough when handling them. I have numerous photos but here is one of my daughters holding a Mud Snake she snatched up by its tail where upon it regurgitated a Mud Puppy. They are not an aggressive water snake. I was helping her radio track Spotted turtles in an SC swamp. She and the Post Doc she was working with also did this at night to location the female turtles nesting.
Mud Snake we are standing in calf deep swamp water.
Spotted Turtle with radio transmitter
Spotted Turtle hatchling being weighted
Most of my snake photos are on paper here are some digital ones.
Yellow Rat Snake climbing down a Sabal Palm
My favorite Brown Watersnake Photo
Young Eastern Diamondback in the dunes at Dayton Beach
They are common on the SE Atlantic barrier islands too.
Timber rattler swimming across Lake Jocassee
Canebrake rattler crossing a dirt road Sparkleberry Swamp
Copperhead Sumter NF, SC
Cottonmouth Moccasin Cedar Creek, SC
I couldn’t find the photo of one with its snowy white mouth wide open, but it is easy to see how it got its name!
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You are a snaky dude.
As a note of trivia, people tend to be horse folks or cow folks but less often both. Horse here, but I did have to argue with dairy cows to fish in my great uncle’s pond when we visited down south. It was in one of the pastures. I learned three useful things about cows. The first is that once they have their heads inside the jeep pulling out sandwiches nothing is going to stop them. The second was that cloven hooves hurt worse than horse’s hoofs when they step on you. The last is that you can knee them in the belly all day long and, unlike a horse, it will never occur to them to lift up their foot.
And Jersey cows though very sweet may at times stalk crying panicking little cousins. Not hurt, just follow so that you have a wailing kid on your hands all the way thru the pasture.
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Not so Welsh Blacks, apparently.
That is tragic. The British Isles, or large portions of, have laws that essentially say someone can walk anywhere. This would be a less common thing in the US. I wonder about the dogs…
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I had some cow encounters in the Italian alps camping.
It was one of those times you were glad the tent was on the roof. They all came right through there.
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The cow article is scary. I have encountered alot of cows on a Pecos Wilderness backpacking trip while getting water. When the cows got too close, we got out of there.
I will wager the dogs may have caused an issue with the cows (stampede or other). Maybe we will see an update.
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This damselfly rode with me for about 45 minutes today. Not nearly as memorable as hugging a humpback but just pleasant; it took off and flew around 5 or 6 times and always returned to the best seat on the boat.
I was thinking about paatit’s post about capturing birds in flight when I took these shots recently.
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I’m a husked potential building beam,
till some bucktoothed carpenter pierces the surface.
Then I’m flotsam, won’t jetsam, a rodent’s worse dream.
Damming mother nature pondering where she had birthed us.
A Slap-Happy Tale To Anger or To Mirth Us
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Portrait of the Artist As a Young Camper
Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo…
And the moocow came down the lane,
and the moocaw passed through skeeter netting,
Mamma’s too late with the oil sheeting.
By James! Tuckoo’s tent had its bedwetting!
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Came across this little guy yesterday. He or she was clearly on a mission pacing back and forth along the shoreline with determination and totally ignoring me.
I spent about 30 minutes hanging out and watching. At one point it seemed like the raccoon took a nap since it kind of turned into a furry sphere and didn’t move for about 10 minutes.
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So Tom, just curious as to what you might have experienced a few clicks back when Zoe sheed ( can’t say “manned” nor “dogged,” can we?) your foredeck, while quietly observing the bandalero bear pacing out its shoreline purposes? My canine associate, somewhat appraised per past noggin knocks as to my disdain for amped-up barks, would nevertheless been leaking high pitched, muted whines and guttural growls, surely sending the raccoon into a curious upright pose before waddling off with admonishments clicked through wrinkled cheeks. It’s tough quietly observing the mammalian critters of bankside when our hounds are honing in those senses and semi-sensibilities. Thank god it wasn’t a fox! My infernal canine uses such moments to turn paddling human associates into otterific failures.
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Thats what I was thinkin!
CWDH, you are correct in that a calm 30 minute encounter with a coon isn’t very likely with a coonhound 10 feet away. However, Zoey was silent in the canoe. She’d save her big voice until just before she got to you…all the better to startle the bejeebers out of you. Although Zoey might ruin close encounters with raccoons, the rest of the time her keen senses were likely to help me see things I would otherwise have missed (in the boat she could not follow scents as she loved to do on land). I need to get another pup; my black lab was so calm and non-threatening that we had many super close encounters with wildlife over her lifetime.
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