Some herpers (and enthusiasts interested in other taxa) keep a list of species they have seen, sometimes called a "life list." Some keep an actual printed list, some put checkmarks in field guides, and some (like me) just rely on memory. It's a source of pride for some, motivation for others. With the large number of species to be seen, you can imagine that there are often gaps in these lists, representing animals that have yet to be found by the person. It's funny how people who have herped for years and years might not have seen some very commonplace species. You can't always be in the right place at the right time.
One gap in my "list" that I have obsessed about is the milksnake. There are many subspecies of this snake that occur in both North and South America. I've been in the range of several subspecies for extended periods of time, but I never found one. While I lived in south Texas for a total of about 6 months for my thesis, I was in the company of Mexican milksnakes, but never saw one. There are Louisiana milksnakes where I grew up, but no luck there either. There are Central Plains milksnakes where I have been attending school for the last 3 years, but I had never found one...until recently.
I work part-time as a field assistant, monitoring the herptofauna of a nuclear arms holding facility in the Texas panhandle. We do radiotelemetry on prairie rattlesnakes and Texas horned lizards, along with finding, marking, and recording any other reptile or amphibian species we come across. A couple of months ago, the area received a huge soaking from several days of rain. Rain can mobilize many herp species, so I was checking coverboards (pieces of wood placed on the ground to encourage animals to use them as shelter, etc.) for whatever I might find. I had lifted a few boards (and carefully placed them back where they originally rested), when I lifted another to find 3 desert centipedes. These are huge black and yellow centipedes whose bite is supposed to be pretty fierce. They're an invertebrate that has been known to prey on vertebrates! I was lowering the board back into place when I thought that one of the centipedes didn't look quite right. I lifted the board again to find 2 centipedes and a little milksnake. The rains must have flooded whatever hiding spot it was in, and it had been using the coverboard for shelter. I snatched it up and it didn't fight at all. It was actually very docile.
Milksnakes are so termed because of an old misbelief that they stole milk from farm animals. Farmers would find milksnakes in and around barns apparently, and chalked their presence up to an association with milk, not to an association with rodents that frequent barns. They share the same colors as some venomous coral snake species, but are harmless. To differentiate corals snakes and milksnakes, you've probably heard the old rhyme, "Red on yellow, kill a fellow. Red on black, friend of Jack (or "venom lack")." That is, in the coral snake, the red and yellow bands are adjacent to each other. In the milksnake, red and black bands border each other.
Not that the facility where I do work has poor habitat, but I would never have suspected to find a milksnake here. It was the first, documented find of the species for the facility, by the way. I hope you enjoy the pictures as much as I did finding this species that has been my bane for some time.
Central plains milksnake
Red-sided garter snake
Massasauga* ( a small species of rattlesnake; this one is a baby)
