An Unexpected Great Day Herping

    On May 2nd, 2015, I went over to Tyler State Park to meet up with my friend to go rock climbing,  as the ground was very muddy beneath the boulder, we started to bring over some rocks to put down.  One of the first rocks I flipped to bring over uncovered a dead Northern Brown Snake.  This would have been a lifer for my friend, and only my second ever, so we kept flipping over every rock in sight.  We soon uncovered a juvenile Eastern Garter Snake along with many Eastern Red-backed Salamanders.  Just as we were about to give up and go back to rock climbing, I flipped a Northern Ring-necked Snake.  This was only the third one I had ever seen, so I was very excited.  After getting many pictures of him, I put him back under his log and watched him disappear.

Northern Ring-necked Snake