Conservation and Management of Snakes of the Xeric Uplands
Savannah River Ecology Laboratory Conference Center, Aiken, SC
October 20, 2000

The workshop was a huge success in my opinion. The day-long function was filled with many interesting presentations. It was hosted as part of the Year 2000 Annual Meeting of the Gopher Tortoise Council (GTC). I thank Tracey Tuberville and others in the GTC and at the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory (SREL) for their excellent work in organizing and implementing this valuable workshop. In the following paragraphs I have summarized a few of the highlights of the workshop. There was much more information than I can write or remember.

Whit Gibbons and Tony Mills, both of SREL, opened the meeting with a presentation featuring specimens of local species.

Whit Gibbons

Tony Mills

Tracey Tuberville, of SREL, presented information learned about the Southern Hognose Snake using radio telemetry tracking. As one would expect, the Southern Hognose was shown to spend a lot of time in holes and burrows. Mole burrows were often used, with the snakes would adding their own exit holes. The Southern Hognose Snake is considered by many to be disappearing from its range, especially in the western portions. Ms. Turbeville pointed out that the species fossorial (underground) and cryptic (hiding) habits make accurate population surveys difficult. One attendee commented that his organization had been making a survey of all the herpetofauna at a site in Florida for 4 years without finding any Southern Hognoses. Then they found 15 specimens within the next year.

Tracey Tuberville

Radio telemetry tracking was an important aspect of much of the research discussed at the workshop. In fact, some attendees were provided a pre-conference synopsis of studies of turtles using radio telemetry tracking. Thursday evening, October 19th, in a special presentation to the attendees to the meeting of the Education/Outreach Sub-Working Group of the Southeastern Region of PARC, Lehr Brisbin, of the University of Georgia, discussed his on-going research in tracking Eastern Box Turtles in suburban neighborhoods. Transmitters have been attached to adult and newborn turtles. Dr. Brisbin related his observations of a specimen which spent several days beside a road in indecision before crossing unharmed in less than 90 seconds. He also told of how newborns would hide in clumps of "monkey grass" and would move from clump to clump. He also said that the greatest danger to Box Turtles in suburban areas resulted, not from automobiles or lawnmower, but from leaf pile burning.

Kevin Enge

Kevin Enge, of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, presented a review of recent information about Scarlet Snakes. He pointed out misleading and incorrect information concerning the diet of Scarlet Snakes. By far, their most important food source is the eggs of other reptiles. They can puncture small eggs with their rear teeth. Larger eggs can be punctured with their pointed snouts. He said that although it may seem incredible that these snakes can subsist on reptile eggs alone, one should realize that a single nest of a larger reptile may supply all the food the snake needs for a entire year. Perhaps the same snake makes multiple visits to the nest over the gestation period.

Mac Baughman, of the Westvaco Corporation, presented the logic behind his company's conservation and management planning for owned forestlands. Westvaco owns nearly 0.5 million acres in the Coastal Plain of South Carolina. Under Westvaco's forest management plans approximately 25 percent of the land is set aside for purposes other than timber harvest, such as wildlife habitat.

Rebecca Smith

Rebecca Smith, wildlife ecologist with Dynamac Corporation, told of her organizations efforts to track Eastern Indigo Snakes in Florida. She related several interesting observations resulting from the radio tracking data. One was that Indigo Snakes live in all types of habitat, from sandy, xeric uplands to wetlands. Another surprising observation was that the Indigo Snakes do not seem to have any special attraction to the burrows of Gopher Tortoises. Ms. Smith has also tracked many Indigos within suburban areas. She plans to continue the tracking data and hopes to determine if the Indigos are successfully reproducing in these suburban areas. The males, due to their roaming ways, are especially susceptible to roadway deaths.

John Jensen

John Jensen, the Georgia State Herpetologist, recounted his agency's efforts to eliminate or modify the 3 annual "Rattlesnake Roundup" held in his state. He pointed out how the roundups in Georgia were more like traditional community festivals with the rattlesnake activities being just one of many events. The sponsor of one of the roundups, that in Fitzgerald, has decided to change the theme of its festival from that of a Rattlesnake Roundup. He has been urging the remaining roundup sponsors to implement more humane and conservation-oriented management.

Steve Bennett, the South Carolina State Herpetologist, presented research activities on Eastern Diamondback Rattlesnakes being conducted at the Webb Wildlife Center in Hampton County. Using radio telemetry tracking, the ranges and seasonal patterns of Diamondbacks are being determined. He said that one female being tracked seemed to have shifted her range one year based upon her apparent memory of where she had last found food the preceding year.

Steve Bennett

Speaking again of fossorial snakes, the last 3 workshop speakers told of research being conducted on Pine Snakes. On a personal note, I have to say the Pine Snake is my "Holy Grail." I have yet to find a live specimen in the wild. A few years back, I found a Sonoran Gopher Snake out West, but I have only found DOR Pine Snakes. To me they are a fascinating species. Pine Snakes are unusual in that they are one of our largest species, yet they spend much of their lives underground. Another unusual characteristic is that newborn Pine Snakes are so large, from 15 to 18 inches in length. In captivity, Pine Snakes grow very quickly.

At the workshop, Mike Duran summarized tracking studies performed for the US Fish and Wildlife Service on the Black Pine Snake in Mississippi. He said the Black Pine is the epitome of the upland snake. From his tracking data, streams and waterways were boundaries to the ranges of Black Pines.

Mike Duran

Jimmy Bullock

Jimmy Bullock, of International Paper Corporation, presented how his company's land use planning efforts incorporated the protection and conservation of habitat preferred by the Louisiana Pine Snake.

Bob Zappalorti, of Herpetological Associates, Inc., compared and contrasted the Pine Snakes of New Jersey with the Pine Snakes of South Carolina. In the New Jersey pine barrens, Pine Snakes are great diggers. They excavate deep burrows in the sandy soil by pushing the loosened soil out the hole by rhythmic movements of their bodies similar to crawling.

Bob Zappalorti

Zappalorti presented an extraordinary account of his team of scientists carefully excavating a winter den of New Jersey Pines in which 14 Pines and 1 Black Racer were found. These snakes apparently started their den in a root hole, expanding it downward and horizontally. Each snake had its own separate hibernation chamber; the chambers were spread along the several burrow branches.

Herpers Find a Coral Snake

As one would expect with any gathering of snake enthusiasts, many attendees used the break times to wander about the SREL Conference Center site. During the period between the workshop and the evening social event, one attendee found an Eastern Coral Snake.

The evening social featured a "Low Country Shrimp Boil" (also known as "Frogmore Stew") and music in 1940s swing band style by Swingsation. GTC/SREL's own Kurt Buhlmann played saxophone.

Low Country Shrimp Boil

Swingsation

Kurt Buhlmann

I found the workshop very interesting and enjoyable. I believe it was beneficial and worthwhile and hope that a similar event will be held next year.