Reptile Fight Club - Grilling the Expert w/ Zachary Gray

Episode Date: April 24, 2026

In this episode, Justin and Rob have another installment of Grilling the Expert w/ Zachary GrayWho will win? You decide. Reptile Fight Club!Follow Justin Julander @Australian Addiction Reptiles-http://www.australianaddiction.comIG https://www.instagram.com/jgjulander/Follow Rob @ https://www.instagram.com/highplainsherp/Follow MPR Network @FB: https://www.facebook.com/MoreliaPythonRadioIG: https://www.instagram.com/mpr_network/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtrEaKcyN8KvC3pqaiYc0RQSwag store: https://teespring.com/stores/mprnetworkPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/moreliapythonradio

Good evening, folks, and welcome to Reptile Fight Club. We are starting a little early. We're going to get a little move on before the guest gets here. So we'll have Zachary Gray joining us here soon. But so for now, it's just me and Rob. We're going to chat a bit until he gets here. But he had a little bit of a delay. You got stuck out in the field.

But, yeah, how's it going, Rob? Yeah, all great here. You know, really warming up, starting to get towards the time of going on adventures and things, which is good. So I'm excited for that. Yeah, you were just on an adventure yourself. Yeah, yeah, we did a quick little trip down to St. George for spring break. So we were going to go to southeastern Utah, but found that it was going to be a little chilly down there. And so the girls were like, yeah, let's go somewhere warmer.

So we decided to go to St. George. And it was, it delivered. It was nice and warm, but I think we drove down pretty much most of the way in snow and rain, like it snowed and rained on us the whole time. So we left, and it was kind of a blizzard up in Logan, Cash Valley area. So kind of crazy. So leaving, you know, freezing temperatures and going down to the 70s and then later 80s. But, yeah, the girls got sunburned pretty bad.

I got a little sun as well, which, but it didn't, fortunately, wasn't too bad. Yeah, so, but yeah, we, we hiked around a couple days. We, I think, we slept out the first night. It was kind of windy and miserable. My daughters didn't sleep much. And I think one, one of them slept in the car and or didn't sleep. She just, like, read her book or something. And then, so they were a little tired the next day.

And, but we did some hikes through, through, we went Chuck Walla Trail and did that trail and did our little deviation. You know, found a few tortoises, including just a, tiny little hatchling. It was really, really fun to see the little fresh babies. Crazy how they can survive. And then a larger tortoise. I mean, the side blotch lizards were out in full force. I think we probably saw 50 of those and, you know, the typical whip tails and spiny lizards as well. So it looks like the spiny lizards went through another taxonomy shift. So now instead of having the yellowbacked spiny the uniformus. As a species, it's now a subspecies of Magister.

And so it's Magister Magister and Magister Uniformis, the west or east and west spiny lizards in southern Utah. So kind of crazy. But yeah, lots of lizard activity. We found your rattlesnake that you found as it should be found. And it was also under a little overhang. on the other side of the valley from where we found it and found a chuck walla hanging out with his head out of the rocks. I spotted him kind of across the valley and then what else do we

oh we're hiking back out. We checked on that rattlesnake like three different times and he didn't move a muscle or rattle or anything just was sitting there just chilling in a pack rat den basically. But yeah, it's kind of fun to see the same individual that we'd seen a few years. When was that? 24. Okay, a couple of years back. That was the first trip, right? Yeah.

23. So it's been a couple of years since we've seen him. Yeah. So that was cool. Always neat to see repeats of the same animal. And then we were hiking the other side of the valley, and we got kind of, we were spread out a little bit, And then we came back together and Grace was like, oh, I saw a little horn lizard.

I'm like, what? Why didn't you tell us? He's like, oh, you were too far away. You wouldn't have heard me. And I'm like, what? I'm like, you always try to catch it and then bring it and show us or whatever. And then she's like, well, I think I know where I saw it. Let's go back.

So I'm like, sure, you know, we'll go back. And sure enough, it was just sitting in the same spot, like sitting up on a rock basket. And she found it. And it was a really nice horn lizard, like one of the nicest ones I've seen. seen down there. So I just posted that recently to my Instagram. But and then hiking out, we, she saw a Gila, like down in like this, it was almost like a hole in the ground. And she saw it like poking its head kind of, you know, inside the hole. But she caught side of it. And she's like, dad, there's one right here. And so, but by the time I got there, it retracted

further down and we, yeah, we couldn't see it or. You can go for the hand to fish out, man. Yeah, I was like, I'm not going to reach down there and try to grab anything, but, you know. But I'm glad she got to see it, you know, and, you know, they're out and active. So we ran into some other herpers out there. And they had, so we had, like, right before we saw those guys, we, Grace found a dead desert toward us that was like, you know, it had been dead a little while. But, and then the. The, we were, it was Blake Malone and his wife, I guess, but Blake, you know,

messaged me a little later and said that they'd seen like six dead desert tortoises on the other side of the valley. And they've seen, they saw a few alive as well, but we didn't see any alive in that area where we'd, I think we've only seen two down there. Well, we've seen a few more than that. I've seen several in that area. But yeah, but seeing six dead ones, and they weren't sure why, you know, why they were dead or what was going on. But they were kind of up higher, like in the, higher up in the rocks and stuff. So kind of strange. But they were all big, like adults, you know, it wasn't like juvenile mortality like you see with the ravens and stuff.

So kind of a strange thing. But I suggested he reach out to like Cameron Rognan and report, you know, the deaths. in the Redcliffe Preserve. So I don't know. Kind of a sad thing. But yeah, it was a great trip and saw some good stuff. And, yeah, had a nice time. The girls were happy and got some son and did some hikes.

But I was surprised, like, I think when the younger sister found the Rattlesnake, and then they were kind of like got a little competitive. Then they're like, oh, now I want to find, you know, all the way. And so they're kind of like going back and forth, you know, what they're finding and stuff. So it's kind of cool. On the first hike on the second day, I flipped one rock and there was a banded gecko under it. It's kind of like I looked like I knew what I was doing. Like, whoa, yeah, you found a gecko.

I'm like, yeah, sometimes you get lucky in there and under here. But we didn't flip too many rocks. But, yeah, it was like, I just like, oh, that rock looks too perfect, you know. one of those things. So it's kind of cool. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I had seen your,

uh, follow you on a naturalist. So I had seen these things. I certainly saw plenty of the, the lizards of the lizards as you described. So, um, and I see that you're,

you know, taking, uh, taking their credo to heart that you for every record and things. So that, you know, there's a robust data set. Um,

the Chris Jensen method of, I'm going to log air. right. Side blotch that I got a picture of. Exactly right. So, no, I thought that was good. I did then see the lutosis, and I had the same thought that you guys did. And I was like, hmm.

And again, we have one, the one that chooses to favor, the crevice life. So that made it all the more likely, or maybe the search image, it looked essentially identical, right? Right. It was sort of seated under a similar ledge. Yeah, I looked at the, that it was. in the same spot. Some of the face markings were, I mean, I'm pretty sure it's the same animal. Like, it had the same stripe on its nose and, you know, the same bandings on its head pattern kind of thing.

So I think, yeah, I think it's strong candidate for the same snake and where it's doing the same thing. At a minimum, obviously, you know, limited distribution within that space. But, you know, at a minimum related, it's not actually the same one. Yeah. I looked at it very closely. I wasn't totally sure, but I did. My instant reaction was, oh, I think maybe I've seen that sanctify form. So that was very cool.

Yeah. I took a number of pictures. I think I posted a couple. But yeah, we went back several times. And then, I mean, when we saw it, it didn't really, wasn't bothered by us. It just kind of sat in the same spot. And we took our pictures. And I don't think, was it still there like a couple of days?

We came back the next day and it was gone, right? Or did we see it the last day? I can't remember. No, we saw the other one multiple times. That's right. Yeah. The big white Oreo thing. Cookies and cream.

I love that look, though. And I mean, this one had a very similar look. A little bit of a darker background pattern. But yeah, really strong dark markings for sure. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Really pretty. Absolutely.

Yeah, there was a. I'm serious about the helis because I, You didn't see that there were no photos. So I was curious if any head evaded you or if he saw tracks and those sorts of things. No, no tracks. So I don't know if they're just not out and active. Like, it still was kind of cool at night, but plenty of people have reported seeing them. I think Aspen, or who was that?

Somebody was down in St. George and found a Gila a week ago or two weeks ago or something. So, yeah, they're out and about, you know, they're coming out. And, you know, it's a little early in the season, but, I mean, you can usually see them in March or April. Less so in March, I think, more so in April and May. And the ones we've seen have, I think, pretty much been in May or late April at least. So I'm trying to think of the first one we saw was had to have been in either early May or late April because it was like, it was, you know, the herpetology class going. down. So class was still in session and usually they get out around, you know, May, first week of May or something. And we went down. It seemed like it was a little cold, you know, for, and that's,

I guess, when you try to coincide trips with the semester, you know, you're not going to get the ideal timing, I guess. But we found a Gila down there. And lots of desert tortoises, you know, chuckwallis, banded geckos, every sort of thing. Oh, and I met up with Aspen. That was cool. I got a text from Bob saying, hey, you know, I'd like to see a better picture of a sand snake. Unfortunately, it was your picture, and I don't know why he did. I think it was like a close up of the face and kind of blurred out around that.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so he's like, oh, you know, was the header for the chapter. And he's like, oh, I want one that's all in, you know, showing the whole. animal. He was, he was, uh, kind of the same way with the cover where he's, I, I gave him a picture of a collared lizard and I said, you know, this would be good. But he's like, well, I want the whole tail on it. I don't want, you know, it zoomed in so you can see the majority of the lizard. Yeah. So now it's got its tail. And I, I still, I would like him to flip it. So it's facing the other way, you know, but he's, I think he's, uh, he, he doesn't want to make very many changes. He's put put some money into

this and he kind of got a little screwed over by Chuck leaving. So that was kind of a rough deal. But so anyway, he wants to get the book out. And I do too. You know, yeah. But there's still some things that need to be addressed. You know, I guess the one thing is the Magister thing. You know, it's like these late stage changes.

It's like, well, do we consolidate it into one chapter that's just Magister? Do we leave it as uniform as Magister? Because they were species when we wrote the book. I don't know like how much your pain to go through to get this thing finished. So hopefully we're in the final stretches. But anyway, so I met up with Aspen. So we're trying to. But for some reason, he also mentioned Tantilla in the same, you know, tags.

So I was thinking we needed new pictures of Tantilla. Because I, you know, we only had like two. and they weren't, you know, the best pitchers of a Tantilla. And so we, and Aspen's like, oh, I got a spot where we can go flip. And, you know, we just, he found some the previous week. So he's like, yeah, we found three or four already. So it shouldn't be hard thing. So we hit the first spot and didn't find any Tantilla.

He found a couple ground snakes, though. It's kind of, you know, one of those frustrating things where I'm out there flipping rocks. And then he got there a little later comes in like the second rocky flips. There's a ground snake under it. And so I took, you know, I took a few pictures of that. And I had my brother's camera, so a real camera with the flash that Jordan lent me. And then so I got a bunch of pictures of that, that first sand snake, the sonora. And then we moved to the second spot and found some more sonora and then found a couple tantilla,

some of the blackheaded snakes. And so, and they, I don't know what it is, but I can usually get. the sand snakes and the tantilla to pose pretty well. So it was holding still, got some good shots of it. And Aspen was helping pose and stuff and getting it squared away. So we got, we both got some pretty good shots of the tantilla. And so I, I had, uh, um, Aspen send, you know, his pictures because he could go home and, and, uh, work through him and, and, and get them all set to send a bob. So I forwarded the email and he's like, no, I didn't want tantilla. I wanted Sonora. And Aspen hadn't taken any pictures of Sonora. So he's like, well, so he went out the next day and got some nice shots of Sonora. And then, so he's, I got home Sunday. And I got, you know, I forwarded Aspen's email. And then I texted Bob. He said, hey, did that work out? And he's like, oh, I couldn't open them or whatever. So I sent him the pictures that I took. So I, you know, I did the pictures. I sent him the pictures I took. And then I sent him the pictures that Aspen took. And then I sent him the pictures that Aspen took.

and he didn't respond or anything. And then he sent the next version and he used my picture, so I feel bad that he had Aspen go out there and, yeah, do all that. And then I'm like, oh, go. So I don't know. I thought Aspins was better in a way because the picture just opposite almost looked identical. It was on the same sort of rock. And, you know, and Aspins was in sand. I was like, why didn't she use Aspins?

Like, I'm, I'm, I think Bob's kind of on his last, you know, he's, he's kind of done. Yeah, with this. And so he's frustrated with the, you know, being left in the lurch a little bit. And so I just want to make sure that, you know, I don't push. I've already pushed and I found out that that's not a good thing to do. Yeah. So I'm like, okay, well, sorry, Aspen. But, yeah, yeah, it's the way it goes, I suppose.

but and then it's credited to you anyway so like let's see if he he realizes that but yeah I'm like I so I said all the you know all the kind of suggested corrections and asked what they wanted to do and and you know I I was a little like some of the taxonomy is you know changed and and Gordon had a bunch of papers that he you know that were showing the crotolus had changed the rattlesnakes had changed the full species and stuff. And so, but it hadn't been recognized on the SSAR site yet. I'm like, well, you know, you said you only wanted to do it was on the SSAR site, but we're doing the rattlesnakes, and that hasn't made it to it yet. So like, okay, what do we, what do we want to do here? And so I think we're just going to leave them as full species because they'll be that way eventually. But we might fudge

a little on the Magister just so we don't have to go back and consolidate the chapters into one. And add more stress to to bob so well it's not as going to be the question right you know is saying okay well naturally i have no exposure to this paper but it's okay do you do you find it persuasive because presumably that's i guess you know as much as uh there's been conversations around the difficulty or not of a book book versus right not a book book the this does seem to be one of the big issues in addition to the arrangement problems and all these things that kind of the the core core issues of like, well, do you find the paper persuasive? You know, and is that deferring, meaning, you know, that SSA are, you know, that you're just going to defer to that list regardless of your own personal, um, interpretations, feelings, whatever it is about the various papers that, you know, provide those descriptions.

Are you, uh, a mix and match, right? Like a deferral with override? I don't know. Yeah. It's hard because we'd already given them, you know, their own chapters, even though they were sub-speech, you know, at least, you know, at least, formerly listed as subspecies, we'd already given like the Great Basin, its own chapter versus con color, you know, which is, should be the same species, just a different subspecies. So technically it was already a little different than the other chapters were laid out. So, you know,

I think from that aspect, it's like, yeah, we'll recognize this because it kind of fits with what we are, you know, a little bit of a preconceived notion. But, you know, it's I, I, so I guess, I don't know, Taxonomy is goofy anyway and just depends on who's doing the work, it seems. Like, you can, I was talking with Jordan Parrott and he was saying, you know, you can bring stuff down to the, you know, to the individual level if you want, you know, their individuals are different from each other. So, you know, where to draw the line. That's kind of that question.

And, you know, my frustrations with some of the other things. And speaking of which, I got eggs from my pygmy band. pythons and um and absolutely huge eggs like they're i think the clutch weighed 68 grams and her post lay weight was 128 grams so like the clutch weighed more than half her body weight and so like that's pretty impressive relative clutch mass uh for for uh um antiregia for sure and you know it's it's got to be significantly different if you did the analysis i'm sure you'd find a significant difference between the other, you know, children I, end quote. No, no, you just include them.

Right. It completes the whole sample so everything looks more similar. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I'm like there's so many different physical characteristics that differentiate these things from other children. I. So, you know, I just don't, I don't buy it.

I don't think. And, you know, he said the academics haven't had a problem with it. It's just been us, you know, hobbyists that are. jumps about it. So I'm fine with that. I'll be a jump about it. But so anyway, well, all right. Well, our guests is join us. We're joined by Zachary Gray. Thanks and thanks for being here and welcome to the podcast. Why don't you maybe give a little introduction? Yeah, thank you all for having me. Yeah, of course. Once again, thank you all for invite me on.

I'm Zachary Gray, and I do endangered wildlife biology work, particularly with herpetafuna in southeast U.S. A lot of my work lately has been tailored towards longleaf pine specialists and habitat restoration work for mostly keystone species, so things like gophertas, some of our other wetland herps, you know, some of the frog species. But, you know, my heart is certainly with the snakes. If I could do snakes the rest of my life for every single project, I certainly would. Right on. What's your favorite? What do you like the best or what group? It's got to be the Louisiana milk snake.

If we're really being nitpicky, you know, if we're really getting down to the nitty-gritty, it's one of my favorites, one of my favorite snakes. Across the board, you know, you get all your different taxonomic splits with different things. So whether you want to call it a species, subspecies, or a local variant, you know, our local bayou milk snakes are probably some of my favorite snakes that I've grown up seeing. They're quite rare. They're quite special. And I've actually learned a lot more about them in more recent years from an ecology standpoint

that makes them even more special to me. But as far as the conservation and more the research side goes, I tend to look more at the larger snakes, So rattlesnakes, so Cortales and Pituofos tend to be my main focus these days. Okay. Is that just because that's the direction the state wants to go or things like that? Or they're more like visible kind of keystone species? Do you have reasoning for that? Yeah.

So my main reasoning for those two groups being the focus is they tend to need a lot higher acreage than a lot of these other species. You get your, your lampapeltas actually don't need as high of a, they don't have as high of a hat attack cost across the board. You know, they can live in smaller, more confined areas, road mortality and habitat degradation. It does hit them just like every other species, but the larger, more active snakes and the ones with different ecology that tend to feed on larger mammals or tend to have larger structure needs, those tends to be of more conservation importance. So I tend to focus on those because they're the ones that were more at risk of losing,

which means we need to learn about them a lot faster in order to kind of negate some of those habitat impact. So that's the main reason that those two have been high on my list, especially in the southeast. Nice. I suspect that if you protect those, you're kind of, you're going to have a byproduct of protecting the milk snakes and other smaller species. Yeah. Once you pick the greatest, the highest common denominator. You're working your way down from there. And, you know, if you're talking to a regular ecologist, they're going to argue from starting

at the soil and the plants and then to your snakes. But it's good to pick a key species of focus, especially a very charismatic species, to get out into the public's eye as well as that you can talk about a little bit more evenly and interconnected rather than starting either at the bottom or the top. They're really good middle ground, large, charismatic animal that you can, you can work. your way in either direction and it's going to work out. Yeah, that's true. And I mean, everything's so integrally tied to each other.

You know, you can't really save the snakes without saving the environment or restoring the habitat that supports the snakes, right? You can't have one piece without the other, especially with more sensitive species. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Are the, are the milk snakes a little less sensitive? Do they deal with human interference a little better? Or are they just better at hiding? So their habitat requirements across the board, Louisiana milksakes in the southeast. It's a weird comparison to make from a habitat standpoint because they live in such different habitats.

But if you think about them, you know, kind of like a swamp, Scarlet King Snake, they have pretty similar habitat requirements. They want bear soil. They want good lizard populations, which, you know, is virtually anywhere that you go in the southeast nowadays. But in particular, their structural needs. So snags and things of that nature, things that they can overwinter in. So high and dry ridges, places that they can nest in become significantly important. And what I've found is that Louisiana milk snakes are quite adapt for some of these regions in South Louisiana. They should be absolutely popping off in some of these places.

And there's really two key factors that tend to limit their survival across the board because it's not really habitat fragmentation because they tend to do well in even very small locations. And they tend to do well in subpar habitats as long as they have some kind of structural support. And that can even be artificial cover. It can be literally can be piles of trash in some areas. So as long as your soils are good for nesting and there's food, they're good. The two main factors tend to be changes have habitat from people overhunting them and then

also presence of hogs. Those two things really tend to whack them pretty hard. Historically, some of these sites that we've had for Louisiana milksnakes were just absolutely chock full of them. And a lot of overcollection, mostly from locals, you know, they've always been kind of like a local specialty for collectors and a lot of overcollection. And if you look at the Hurt market nowadays, you don't see a lot of Louisiana milk snakes like on the market. I mean, there's maybe one or two breeders in the whole country that will breed locality, Louisiana milks.

So it just goes to show that even though they were collected, they never made it into the pet trade, which ultimately means they weren't really taking care of. And there wasn't a lot of interconnected breeding that people were doing for these snakes. It was just people going out, collecting them, sticking them in their garage, and then they die. Right. So there was a lot of that throughout the 60s and 70s.

really hammered them back to a point where a lot of their stumps weren't there. And then what was left, a lot of hogs took out. So actually the biggest common denominator between the best milk snake sites is, can people get there? And if the answer is not easily, then the milksnakes are probably doing pretty good. And then the next thing is can the hogs get there? And if there's no hogs there or hogs are at least being eliminated as a threat, then you're probably going to have pretty stable Louisiana milk snake populations, which is really cool to see. Yeah, that's good to know there is at least some areas where they're going to have a stronghold or, you know, at least be able to have their, you know, thriving population in the face of somebody changes elsewhere in their habitat.

Yeah. Yeah. Darn those ferals. One thing I was, one thing I was also kind of looking at was, you know, a lot of people worry about climate shifts and coastal shifts because a lot of our Louisiana milks get really close to the coast. And we figured that more coastal erosion and potentially some of these major hurricanes would be losses for these snakes. And really what we're seeing is that those coastal events tend to be really important disturbance events for Louisiana milk snakes. So the same way that a fire rolling through an area for a Scarlet King would knock down trees, create more snags, potentially create more tip-ups. You actually get the same thing with a lot of your coastal oaks for Louisiana milk snakes.

So you'll have snags that were perfectly usable. Hurricane rolls through, knocks them down. Now you've got a down log and a lot of exposed roots, but it's also going to kill other trees with saltwater intrusion. You've got new snags that eventually those snakes move into. So definitely a lot of interesting habitat dynamics. But yeah, like you were saying, the feral hogs are just one of the worst things for them. Yeah, that's frustrating.

And, you know, they're so smart and adapt, you know, that they can adapt so easily to just so many different habitats that they're just a pain. Yeah. When Rob and I were in the northern territory in Australia, we were going to look for Owen Pelley pythons, and we got to the site where we were going to start looking, and there was just a big group of feral hogs out there and you're just like, come on. And you can tell when they've come through an area because it's just the whole area just ripped up.

Yeah, it's terrible. I've never see the direct I've never seen a hog with a milk snake kind of hanging out of his mouth now you know smoking a milk snake like a cigar but you go

and you see a perfect free and you know like oh my miss you know that there's like four or five of them just living in here you know it's great nesting and you come back a year later and the whole thing is knocked over and rooted through by hogs and you're like oh goodness that's it's not a lot for them with those hogs around

but they still are pretty fosorial overall. They'll get understuffs. So they're, they're hanging on even in places where there are ferales. It's just not as successfully. That's like same thing that the Australian species are experiencing a lot of times. Right. So with the, I guess, being more fosorial in more of a swamp land area, I mean, does that water table interrupt that? Or does it make it more difficult to get down? Absolutely. So a big thing for Louisiana milk snakes tends to be that overwintering. habitat, which is when the hogs get them. Because sometimes we get temperatures that they can actually sustain within the centers of larger snag over the wintertime. And that's where the hogs and people with crowbars and axes really, and once again, the state of Louisiana, one of the

very few that has to clarify this in their laws. In other states, it's like, oh, you know, please be respectful of the habitat in the parks. Louisiana explicitly states, please do not crowbar and axe open the snags to hunt for snakes. I've never seen that in legislation for anywhere else. It's a Louisiana specialty. They tend to overwinter in the centers. And most of the time, unless we have a really harsh winter, they can survive like that. But those high ridges, especially river delta ridges, so some of those sediment deposits where the river just dumps a bunch of sediment and it's high and dry, those tend to be the controlling factors on population size. And those tend to be the limiter. So however many of those ridges you have that they can lay their eggs into

and overwinter in tends to be the thing that defines your density of milksnakes. Now, they can survive in some pretty crazy stuff if climate allows for a little while. Like, I would imagine there's been times where they would overwinter in really large Cyprus snags in Cyprus swamp. We definitely have evidence that they move through those areas, and they are a more snag-dependent Western milk snake variant for sure. So all that's to say is they definitely have their own unique flavor down in Louisiana. They're very unique, locally adapt milk snake subspecies. You know, they're just super, super special.

Some of my favorite things about them are just, they're very built for snag life. So they're longer, they're more cylindrical than more your red milks and your Western milks out towards like Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas. they're just a wetland milk snake and just everything in their body kind of reflects that but they certainly have their struggles they're not nearly as successful as the milk snakes in like Kansas so obviously living in the swamp is a lot harder on these snakes than you know living under a rock on a roadside edge right well and we see the same thing here in Utah they're very difficult to I mean maybe for some people but most people it's very difficult to come by them and the further east to go, the easier they are. You know, you get to Colorado, you find maybe, you know, a few more and then get to Kansas and it's ridiculous, you know, you're getting. Yeah, yeah, you get that core range where all the, all the little specialty milks kind of branch out from. I guess, yeah, I guess those, those Plains milks are just, I mean, that's about as successful as you can get for a milk.

Tell you what, they're doing great out there. No, no habitat concerns for them. Well, and I think, too, like you mentioned, it might be just a matter of detection. Like, it's harder to find them in Utah because they spend more time underground, you know, and there, you got to flip rocks to find them. And, you know, that's not the funnest, you know, thing to do it for a day. And I spent, I think to find my first one, I spent, you know, several days flipping rocks. And yeah, at 50, it's not the funnest activity. Yeah.

is a big detection is a pretty big thing when it comes to knowing what we're talking about because even with Louisiana milksnakes, you know, our detection is limited.

We know that they branch right up to the salt marshes, but how would we know if they would be traveling through those or using any smaller habitats in there or some of the other things that they can expand into that maybe they're just fully

fosorial and nocturnal. What we can see is definitely a limiting factor as to what we know, of course, you know. Right. We can set cameras. We can search the best of our abilities. And, you know, we think we, we think we have a good basis, but it only takes a

couple of exceptions to come along where it's like, okay, we've got to, we've got to put some hours in and some really difficult habitat to know the full picture. Yeah. And, you know, I was talking to my buddy. We were out looking for, for any, any kind of snakes. And it was a little cold, but we weren't finding much. But we were talking about, you know, placing tin in different areas. And he said, you know, they, he'd placed some artificial cover and they'd had success.

You know, the, the milks were kind of moving underneath the cover and stuff. And so, you know, I was kind of like maybe challenging a little bit on that side of like, well, you know, you're putting garbage into the environment kind of thing. And he said, well, you know, if it supports the milk snakes and it makes them easier to detect, then we can know, like, okay, they're in this area. And it may help them or, you know, give them a suitable. place to thermoregulate or whatever. And if it means that they're easier to find for us, then we can, you know, know, know kind of the full extent of their range or whatever within these other maybe areas where we don't know much about them, you know, versus the places where everybody knows where to go, look for them and stuff. So, and, you know, he and his, his buddy

of, uh, it's Pat, Pat May and Ray Jones of like, yeah, yeah, found a lot of different populations through the state as well as Brian Eager. You know, there's a few just hardcore milk snake guys in Utah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So it's kind of a cool thing. And they've definitely expanded our knowledge on where to find them within the state and beyond. Absolutely.

And even in the ecology and the academic world, you know, king snakes, every time they look into king snakes, they really just want to go deep on the taxonomy. You know, they're just like, oh, where does one start and the next begin? And, you know, there's definitely fun things to discuss there, but I really don't see a lot on land propelts ecology. It's like it's the species that people want to keep as pets, and it's the species that has all of this variation across different habitats. And you would think that a species that could live in multiple different habitats with taxonomic discrepancies would lead to a lot of ecology studies. but there really is very little on the ecology of king snakes and milk snakes. So it's something that I've taken pleasure and kind of learning about from the ground up for sure. Because like you're saying, there can be questions on, well, are you seeing this animal in this area because it's the only way to observe it?

Are you actually seeing its habitat usage and patterns? Because in some areas we'll go out for, like for instance, in Sandhill habitats, there will just be absolutely no ground cover. maybe even no vegetation, and you set a little bit of artificial cover or even, heck, I've had luck with bringing in logs, natural logs into areas. And you flip it, and sure enough, you find these little fossorials that previously had gone undetected. It's like, well, clearly they're living underground in softer sand habitats, and they don't necessarily need that cover. They don't need that structure that you're potentially offering to them,

but you did need it as a point of protection. So their habitat usage is to be determined because all we're seeing from them is how we're seeing them under things rather than when they're coming out at night or after storms or what tunnels and other structures they might be using. So, you know, great, great analysis there to just ask questions on, you know, what are these animals using in the first place. Right. And that was a big question in Utah is what their population was because, you know, back in the early 2000s, we'd, you know, back in the early 2000s, we'd, didn't really have a great idea of how, you know, if they were impacted by collection, back then collection was completely prohibited. And they've recently changed the law. They actually paid us, you know, reimbursed us gas money to go out and hurt basically to see if we could find

them, you know, in different areas where they weren't recorded from or how hard they were to find at different times of year. And, and then, you know, the law has actually changed. in kind of a, you know, reasonable way where you could collect a couple and, and then they made it, you know, possible that you could actually breed them and things like that and from those wild caught animals. So it wasn't, you know,

and it's all under permit type thing. You know, you apply for your permit. They have a little education thing that you have to go through, which is really encouraging to see a state do, you know. That is really cool, actually, because there's so many species, He's like, for example, I've seen Speckle Kings down here be absolute dime a dozen in a lot of areas. Right.

And, you know, I feel like there's certain areas, certain maybe management habitats that, you know, collection would really hit them hard quickly. But then you've got all of these, these urban lots and just random city properties that they're just, they get, they get up to a point where all they can do is expand and die on roads. Yeah. And I look at those populations and I'm like, well, you know, I kind of wish. someone would come in and save some of these genetics, save some of these populations. I don't know how to legislate this, but I sure do know that it's doing these snakes no good where they're at. They've reproduced to their carrying capacity here. And if somebody wants to do a little bit of F1 project from specimens and whether it's for

recreation or it's for educational showcase, you know, those are certainly things to keep in mind. Because, you know, once again, king snakes are, that some people's first interaction with these animals is the pet trade. And what are the two best ambassadors for snakes in the world? I guess probably the best three would be king snakes, corn snakes, and hog-nosed snakes. Right. They've probably done more for a little guy than any other species.

And, you know, all snakes eventually at some point have come from the wild. So you got to find ways to ethically. and properly do that without hurting populations. You know, like we've said, the Utah milks have, according to the current data and the habitat analysis, they're widespread. It can be findable in some of these areas. And, you know, as long as people don't go in and collect, you know,

a whole population of them, you know, taking one or two out for captive breeding and collection shouldn't have any harm. Yeah. And it was kind of encouraging because, you know, another Thomas Wilder, He's like the mountain king snake guy in Utah. Like he's found, you know, hundreds of them. And he said that, you know, even from some of the popular spots where a lot of people go to collect, you know, their two or whatever, he says he hasn't seen really a decline in the numbers that he typically seen.

So it's not even really impacting even the areas where everybody goes. So that's pretty encouraging. That's true. So it just sounds like, you know, the idea that. that they're just difficult to detect. They're hard to find. Not that they're rare or, you know, endanger.

Yeah. And sometimes what will happen, kind of like how we would talk about flip detection is you'll have these really special spots that will be found, especially when you're talking about your Mountain Kings, where you get very specific rock out crops, very specific areas. And, you know, not all Mountain Kings are the same.

There's some that are more isolated, some that are more plentiful and more connective, especially as you get towards California. You'll have this area with like, a couple of dozen just perfect sealed nice rocks that are just like, okay, we're going to have a mountain king here. Right. But once you flip those rocks, you know, they're not going to be as good for the rest of

the season afterwards because they're not sealed. It's not like the perfect place for them to pop out in the spring. Right. So if you have a hundred people go to that one spot and flip the same rocks, they're probably not going to see the snakes. It doesn't necessarily mean that there are less, like let's say you, you know, have a couple of collections that happen over the course of the season. But the fact that people aren't observing them is probably more due to the habitat being disturbed. And, you know, that rock is

going to take a whole year to weather back into place and get, you know, all the rain that kind of seals it back up for those snakes to use again. Right. So there can be some detection bias there. And I guess that's kind of down to the herping snake community to determine, like, you know, keep certain spots hidden just where you can detect. snakes better versus you know you want areas for people to go and see publicly you kind of got to weigh the pros and cons of how you present that to people because there might not be a worry about the snakes but there might be a worry about you getting to see your snakes you know it's like you come back's like well I knew that rock was going to have one under it but not anymore

I know he's around here somewhere he's just not under my rock so yeah he's under a much bigger rock that can't be flipped yeah exactly right Yeah, I think about that a lot. How many am I walking past, you know? Yeah. All right. Well, Rob, I'm sure Rob has a lot of questions for you. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I guess can you talk a little bit? So I became aware of you because I think your YouTube is the only life's wild adventures,

is the only one that I'm aware of that has a wild black pine snake, you know, video. and that brought my attention to your channel. I thought there was a ton of cool stuff there. So I want to run through some of those things that then had me looking in reverse, and I saw that you were involved with a paper on a range extension for Black Pines. So you want to talk through a little bit of what you're doing now and what you're doing kind of going forward. Yeah, absolutely. So Black Pines kind of caught my attention essentially right around the time where they became a protected species.

and I was wondering as to why that was the case compared to some of your other pine snakes because not all of our pine snakes are protected, especially not all of our pituitous. And it got me questioning. I was like, what's happening with these snakes that's not happening with others? Like, why are we losing these ones at an extreme rate? And the first one that I ever saw was unfortunately hit on a highway. And, you know, obviously my first thought process there became, okay, well, these things are dying on the road. and the first couple of observations that I saw publicly from people,

friends of mine even, would then hit on the road's dead. It's like, wow, the roads seem to be really smacking them. Is there any kind of hope that we can even find here? We've got to learn more about what we're working with here. And over time,

I met some of the people on the recovery teams for really all of our long leaf and paroled species in the southeast. And I got closer to them and their projects. and I got to see the work that they've done. And so I kind of set out on a mission to collect data that would be assisting their conservation projects while not imposing or potentially putting a target on any of the locations that are of really conservation concerns. So I started working on the outskirts of the core of the black pine range. And what we ended up seeing is basically confirmation for a lot of what we know.

they need large, expansive acreage of long-leaf pine savannas. But some of the areas that they're holding on to are these very small sandhills that, as we were talking about with milk snakes earlier, we need these core overwintering habitats. And sandhills seem to be that in a lot of the outskirts of their range. And what we ended up doing is finding private landowners on both sides, both east and western sides of the range that had decent habitat that was holding on to these small remnant populations but wasn't actually sustainable to some degree. You know, they were losing habitat fast. We've seen diseases in that same paper that we published.

We actually had a 100% positive snake fungal disease detection on all the black pine snakes from that range extension. Yikes. percent of them. We found a couple with very severe cases of snake fungal. And so we were really just seeing what's the difference between these outer ranges versus the core. And eventually decided, I was like, you know what, it's probably time that we actually document this publicly because we actually had a couple of snakes in the state that were just killed by random people. And they're like, hey, what kind of snake is this? I killed at my yard. I'm like, okay. So we do, we do need, these are ending up in people's spaces at times. It's unlike.

but it does happen. So we need to put out some kind of educational content on this. So ended up doing that back in 2022 is the first one. And we've gotten to include Black Pine, both documentation as well as information across a myriad of other videos, especially Diamondback and Gopher Tortoise videos with them not being necessarily the core of the conversation, but being included in the habitat restoration and general location conversations. But as far as Blackfines are concerned, I can definitely agree with their federal listing. They are very much so not doing great. In fact, some of these core ranges, you know, even with those decreasing, they're not necessarily the most stable,

but the outside ranges where we're finding some of these new populations, I mean, you're probably looking at, A dozen. We're talking genetic bottleneck. And it's only getting worse as these roads increase in traffic. We noticed during COVID an increase in snake mortality as people started moving to the country. So some of these areas that had gone decades with without a major impactful event had a huge flood of people to them, higher traffic and higher snake mortality. That's definitely a concern for some of these areas. But on the ecology side for for black pines we've really just every single one that's been seen has been an improvement in our knowledge about the snakes it's almost like where indigo snakes were maybe 10 15 years ago and we're we're kind of catching up quickly on our pine snake ecology and we've had to make a lot of inferences from some of the great work that's been done up in new jersey with northern pines and a lot of the more consistent variables that we see with florida pine snakes down in Florida and Georgia.

But we're starting to see more of the Black Pine story. It's similar to the other ones, but not quite one-to-one because of the geography in some of these areas and because of some of the geographic isolation. But it's definitely been a species of concern as I've continued my academic career with some of these larger snakes. And I mean, some of the people that we have that are working to recover these species are really high quality people, putting in massive amounts of hours, massive amounts of effort to collect even just these little tidbits of data that we can here and there for furthering,

you know, with all of the nonsense that sometimes happens in conservation projects and all the nonsense that happens when you're trying to get teams together and get people to agree and work on full-on, like, scalable conservation. Even with all that, we've got people that are still doing their best to put their best foot forward to do conservation for these animals, which is, it's very encouraging for sure. Nice. Have you found any really good tools to help the research along? I mean, like you said, it's hard to study snakes, basically. Yeah, the detection and how long they can just sit in one place makes it difficult.

I think some of our best tools tend to be things that a lot of biologists are utilizing. but sometimes I think to find these fringe habitats, these places that are like barely holding on that you need to hop on quickly to help conserve, you've got to look a little bit closer at like one or two things. So like a lot of biologists use GIS mapping and they run all these different factors, the tree cover, the undergrowth, the soil, the geography. And sometimes you just need to isolate a couple of those factors to see what could be left at just a few of these things. So, for example, I tend to look primarily with Pituitopis specifically. I tend to look at soil. And you can really get a picture as to their habitat shrinkage when you look at the soil. Because if you think about it like a battle, you know, you've got on this side, you've got urban development and maybe roadside development. And on this side, you've got these rural areas that are kind of getting degraded more and more. You have that line, that front line of the battle that just gets pushed back and back and back.

But all of a sudden in the middle of that, there's just this bunker. There's this one spot where they just held out. You know, they've got their guns aimed in all directions and they're holding out. And you're like, okay, what made that one little circle, that one little spot where they held out different from all the other ones? Okay. And really what we're seeing is the individual components that these animals need to survive at smaller and smaller levels as we look at some of these sites. I have some sites that soil composition is the only. thing these animals have going for them. And it just keeps it open and sunny enough to where there's

just enough grasses, just enough burrows, just enough rodent population that they can survive and not have to move too far to get into these to these more road and more heavily trafficked areas. On the other side of things, we have sites that are just totally dense canopyed out, like just not a speck of sunlight hitting the ground. And you'll have this one tiny exception, one little grassy spot with a perfect stump hole and they will hold on in that. So we found them in incredibly open, almost desert-like conditions and we found them in overly planted, overly forested areas. And when you isolate those things and you see why they're surviving, it kind of paints

the whole picture as to what these animals need in a perfect habitat. So it gives us a fuller picture for the priority conservation areas. I mean, a lot of people know that the Camp Shelby Wildlife Preserve areas that are just no public access. It's just only military access, essentially. We've understood that that's the core of their population, but it's been hard to understand why at times. You know, it's just geography or like that was just kind of where the mutation that is black pine snakes tend to from and kind of branch out from. But really what we're seeing with that is it's just the core of what their habitat is. I would imagine back in the 40s, 50s, 60s, these snakes were doing really well across the range.

We even see some of the historic pet trade stuff kind of reflect that. Back in the 60s and 70s, black pine snakes were being sold across the southeast people. And they were just ending up in pet shops. They were a relatively abundant snake because their habitat was still somewhat intact. And 60 years later, most of those places where they were even being collected, from they don't even exist. And it's not even necessarily due to over-collection, although that was probably some factor in their demise.

The biggest thing was just total habitat laws. Wow. So soil composition is probably the biggest thing that I found of importance when it comes to their overwintering. We still have a lot of questions when it comes to their nesting behaviors. D diets tend to be pretty well-rounded. We know that they like to eat the same things that other pine snakes eat. So big cotton rats, deer mice.

Quail is a pretty big one. So this is a good argument to make for a lot of your more game and habitat-focused people. Whale and juvenile quail and turkey nests tend to be a major boom for black breeding. If they can get a couple of good turkey and quail nests in the spring, it can really up their reproductive success. And we see that across Florida pine snakes. And we have a few preliminary observations with black sheep. black pine snakes that would indicate something similar. So that habitat improvement where you're introducing other factors like those ground nesting birds, it makes all the difference in their long-term

survival. Interesting. And how about the prospects for like improving, you know, soil kind of moving outwards from where they are, restoration type projects? Is that kind of the focus? Or, you know, is that how we're going to bring them back to a larger area is, is restoring that soil composition or the factors, biotic factors that would promote that? So one of the things over in Mississippi, I think why pine snakes have been consistently rare across this part of their range is that soil limiting factor because this region doesn't have a lot of sand hills. It doesn't have a lot of those deep sandy soils. We get more of the clays, more gravelly clay. And we get some filthy sands. We get some sandy stuff.

But it's not like beach sand like you'll get in Florida and maybe even some of these pine barren habitats up north. Right. What we're looking at is a limitation on soil, which means the other factors are what historically allowed them to do well. What we need to do is reconnect our fire corridors and take out a lot of trees. The forestry and the lumber industry has really taken a toll on our habitat down here. And it's not something that we really understood in decades past. And we were just like more trees. You know, they'll do fine.

But we really just overcrowded our forests. And we have a lot of pine trees to get rid of to really restore our systems. I don't think they're lacking on stump holes. I think the quality of stumps can be improved by reintroducing fire into some of these habitats. And I think as you reintroduce that grassland component, you're going to have more mice, more ground nesting birds, which is going to really kick their reproduction into overdrive in the wild. I think right now, from a legislative standpoint, finding those key locations and then expanding slowly out from those, but also removing the factors that cause some of these other

populations to get low in the first place. And that's where the areas that I look at is kind of struggle because some of these places you're like, man, what can we even do? Because we've got small acreage, but really good overwintering habitats. So we can improve this to the maximum. And that's what myself and many of my partners have been doing, just consistently setting everything on fire, thinning trees, planting grasses, trying to get some of those native understory species back in place. Okay.

So the hopes that Black Pines would move around a little bit less, maybe not have to leave these habitats. They'll be able to stay a little bit longer, eat a little bit more consistently, and nest a little bit safer. But you're still going to have snakes that are going to try to cross roads. They have very large home ranges. So aside from, goodness, underpasses and road overpass, it's like, goodness, what do you even do about this? It becomes kind of an extreme scenario of projects just to where a couple of snakes can get under the road, maybe get under the road a couple of times in the early summer and it becomes pretty extreme. So the question becomes, where is the extreme engineering and habitat work most necessary? And I think the best thing

that we can probably do is improve our forestry practices, you know, keep getting people into the forestry service that are happy to do control burns, happy to re-implement that Savannah component. And then for these fringe habitats, a lot of places that I'm working and helping, just really hope that we can get the cores of those overwintering habitats back what they need to be with really nice stump holes, really nice go for tortoise burrowing, really nice understory for all their food. Get that back looking at what it has to and just hope that they can reproduce enough to kind of keep up with that demand as some of them are lost to these other areas. you can certainly look long-term. I definitely think there's a component of captive breeding programs that will be brought in at some point. That's certainly more from the state level,

more from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and all the work that they do with these species. But it's going to be a major component. So the genetics, at the very least, I hope some of the genetics are rescued from some of these fringe habitats. But I would hope at best, potentially some of these cores could be expanded a little bit over time to where reintroduction could happen. And some of these really nice sandhills that might be a bit smaller, they'd still be hoped for the species long term. But it's definitely an uphill battle.

Conservation consistently is an uphill battle. But we have the preliminary information and we're putting together larger data sets that will help combat a lot of these issues that they're facing. Oh, very cool. Have you noticed or do you think that there's a structural difference between Loblolly and Longleaf Pine in terms of the impact on, you know, carrying capacity within a given Sand Hill habitat? Yeah, so I'll say this. At first, it's kind of a bell curve of information because at first you're like,

loblolly pine suck and you want long leaf. And then at the top of your bell curve, you've got, well, you can have a lob lulley savanna and lob lulley stump holes and it works just as well for a lot of your long leaf species. And at the end of it you have, no, you really do need to have your long leaf behind Savannah and your long leaf reestablished. A lot of these fringe sites that we're looking at have almost a total absence of long leaf, basically an ecological absence of long leaf. And we see definitely a reduced understory diversity. and we also see a different nutrient gradient across soils. And for these deeper soils of really deep sand hills,

Lablilis just are not adapt for them. So your production, your just overall habitat production is going to be lower on these sandhills if it doesn't have long leaf. The other thing to look at is what a long leaf pine offers structurally compared to a lob lulli. Historically, you know, humans have built their houses out of longleaf and la blah. We've gotten to see the difference in wood structure.

Loblali are not as rot resistant. They're not as bug resilient. And the stumps that they offer, the wildlife tend to showcase that as well. Even if you have a 60 to 80 year old lob lally that ends up falling over, creating a snag and creating a stump, it's going to not provide as long term of a structure as a long leaf wood because you have a couple of fires rolled through,

a little bit of rot, little bit of bugs, and that stump might be gone within a decade. Some of these long leaf stumps and tipovers that we're seeing are the same ones that were being studied in the early 2000s. Like the same exact stump year after year species going in and out of it, going in and out using it. So long leaf is a more resilient structure. It's a more resilient ecosystem. And when you're trying to build something that is more resilient to loss, long leaf.

becomes a key component. So as a stop gap, if you have to create a Loblolly Savannah to up your production, get some quail into there, get some deer mice, they're not going to necessarily care about it being long leave. But what I would tell people to do if they have property and they're trying to manage for these species, get your savanna components in first, those grasses, all those productives, they're going to be great for your snakes, they're going to be great for your rattlesnakes, are going to be great for your pine snakes.

Get that fire component in there. Get those grasses. Keep some of your pines, though. You know, you don't have to wipe out. You don't have to create a prairie to have habitat. You can leave some of your lob-wally pines up. But make sure that you slowly introduce your long leaves into that understory. Because a long while's from now, someone's going to thank you for having the sense to put in some long leaves.

Because it does make a huge difference long term. Because I've certainly noticed the work of people whose names I'll never know from the 60s, 70s and 80s. I go out and be like, man, somebody had some really good sense here what to do for this habitat. They thinned it, they burned it, they planted it, and they upkept this in a way that now many decades later, it's just stellar for wildlife, particularly those critically endangered reptiles. Yeah, great stuff. So, other than good luck, what have you learned anything about sort of observability of? black pines in terms of conditions, time of year, anything like that that you're at liberty to talk about? Yeah, so they're pretty similar to your other pine species. They're going to be

waking up in those sandhill habitats and they're going to be dispersing out from there. A lot of people in the herping community have definitely noted that low pressure systems moving through. Actually, one of my more recent pine snake observations was quite interesting because we had a severe tornado warning. And it was rolling through that night. And sure enough, driving along and there was just an absolutely gorgeous, probably about a four-foot female black pine snake. And I got out and I just followed her back. So like this was a unit that I wasn't particularly doing any of my work in. So really all I need to do. was note that the snake was there and I got some really great shots following the snake.

And I just watched because I'm like, what are these snakes doing? The last few that I've seen, I'm just watching. I'm like, where are you going? What are you doing? And this one, it went off the road. I need the under story. And it actually coiled up under a stump. And I sat there for a while.

And it just kind of came out. And then it went straight down a stump hole that I can barely see. But she was really antsy. She was very active. And I was like, man, where is she going in such a hurry? And it was such a trip because the next day I came back to that area because on our weather maps, it showed that we had two tornadoes touchdown right there. And there was just tornadoes across the whole state, but exactly right there that low-prudry system was the most evident.

She was just booking it. And I don't necessarily always observe that with them. Sometimes they're sitting pretty still. Sometimes they're moving along just like. any other snake. I mean, once again, a lot of the behavioral analysis that you'll see with them is pretty similar to your gopher snakes, your bull snakes, your Florida pines, your northern pines. It's just that their density is a lot lower and their habitat requirements are a little bit more specialized for the terrain that they're in. So low pressure systems is certainly an important

thing. Another thing that I've noted about Pituvius in general is when they first wake up, they're really a learning snake and this is what I love about both crotes and pits in general is they tend to run these little routes so they'll wake up from kind of their favorite

overwintering spot and whether it's scent whether it's smell whether it's remembering where these holes are they like to run a route of I'm going to hit all of these holes in this certain area and they tend to go in a line kind of leading them back towards wetlands

where they can spend their summertime in those gradient areas. But they want to check holes and get mice. They want to check habitats and get food. And I have a lot of questions with that. If there's areas that maybe quail and turkey would nest on an annual basis,

if they would include that into their feeding routes, so to speak. But certainly structures that will have rodents, they happily and consistently will pass those areas, check those holes, and keep moving along if there's nothing in them. Or if there's something there, they'll raid a

nest and keep moving. So early season, structural route checking is a pretty big thing for pit to office, and then obviously the low pressure systems for sure. Very cool. Absolutely. In terms of observability, and I suppose some of this just speaks to the nature of development that has happened over the last century plus, certainly within a Florida context, right? Just looking for reptiles generally. For the most part, it involves looking on dirt. Conditionally, it depends what you're looking for. It depends on time of year, all these things. But would you say in a pine context that you're talking dirt or paved or hiking them up?

Or what does that usually look like? So this one definitely is an interesting question because I prefer hiking across the board. But my life has gotten so much better since I've mostly given up cruising. I'm like, yeah, I like being in the habitat and I like analyzing. It's certainly not something to practice out west for sure. That's more of a southeastern pocketed habitat special. But we tend to see them more on areas that are cutting through those sandhills. So whatever access that may be, obviously you can cover pretty good ground on road.

But once again, we have such small sand hills that it's so difficult to see them live on roads because all of these people tend to see them on. I mean, it's like five to one on hit snakes. You'll see five hit ones dead on the road before you see one live. I have a buddy of mine who lives in the eastern parts of the range. So kind of on the Alabama, Mississippi state lines. And he's seen plenty on blacktop last year. but most of them have been dead. So there's heavily trafficked areas that people are just moving into.

You can get them on blacktop, but the odds of CN1 hit are unfortunately a lot higher than CN1 live. And they don't tend to stay on blacktop like other snakes. So they're not sitting and necessarily basking in heat. They're just crossing. So any open space where they can be seen, bare soil, I would say is a pretty big thing. If you can see areas that have a higher percentage of bare soils,

they're more likely to spend longer sitting in those areas asking and kind of just thermo-regulating than they are to sit on blacktop. Personally, I don't think there's a big difference between it for them. I think for things like your croats, you know, diamondbacks, I tend to say, you know, blacktop all the way. If you can be on blacktop and good habitat, pick blacktop. If you don't have that option of good habitat and blacktop, pick a gravel road that has, good habitat. If you don't have a gravel road option, just hike structure. But that's essentially, with pine snakes, you're not going to get that basking

category in with your blacktop. So I think they all kind of range pretty similarly. So it just depends on how much ground you can cover. And like I said, it's not like we've got 100 miles of sandhill stretching. Some of these sand hills might be only like 20, 30 acres of habitat. So I guess the question is how much can you stand to drive the same 20, 30 acre loop to, you know, potentially see a snake crossing, in which case, unfortunately, I'll end up hit versus hiking in the habitat and, you know, getting to see one that way. And I've had a lot more special moments with hiking. So I'm inclined to recommend hiking, but, you know, it is not, I'm not going to lie and say that it's super.

easy. It's definitely quite the learning curve on structure and habitat down here. So I would I would say both are pretty decent. I wouldn't really rank one above the other. I would say probably pretty equal amounts found on both methods. They don't tend to use cover though. I'll say that much. They are not very cover specialty. I don't think, gosh, I don't think there's ever been one genuinely seen or flipped under natural cover. Not that at least I can remember. You know, so everything that they're in is more so underground and artificial. They don't really, you know, you can have them use artificial cover to some degree.

And I think they would use a roadside board. I think they would go and clear out a nest rodents under one. But they're a really mobile snake. They like wide habitats. and they like stumbles. Like that's their deal. So that's the best places that they're going to be hanging out for sure, which Mississippi needs a lot more of.

Yeah, fair enough. I think there's a ton there. I really appreciate it. Do you have any thoughts on Louisiana ponds? Pretty much the same things across the board consistently. I mean, obviously a lot more effort has gone into restoring Louisiana ponds. habitat corridors. There's definitely a lot of concerns on the private lands that they're still found on.

Some great people working with the Louisiana pine snakes. I mean, goodness, Audubon Zoo, Alexandria Zoo and Memphis Zoo putting in serious work on captive breeding and release. Just so, so much more data on Louisiana pine snakes when compared to black pines. but a huge determining factor between those two is pocket gopher presence because Louisiana pine snakes are almost just, they've got to be around pocket gophers. Like it's, it's their thing. They burrows. And other than that, they have pretty similar structural needs, pretty similar habits.

They like to come out whenever it's 100 something degrees for no apparent reason sometimes, which is pretty silly. but, you know, they're both certainly pit to ophus. They both certainly like to act like pitifulis across the board. Louisiana milk snakes are certainly, I would say, of greater conservation concern. But at the same time, there's a lot more efforts to help them. So I'm hopeful about, I'm hopeful about seeing higher pine snake observations across the state within my lifetime. because some of the national forest areas that they've worked in have gone really well. Absolutely.

Another snake of Louisiana that presumably is of interest is the Canberraudrtle snake, and that's something that both Justin and I have yet to see, and one of three forms left for me. I'd love to hear any in all thoughts on both the ecology conditions, time of year to try and find them. Any of that stuff is great. Goodness. How long you'll have on Louisiana cane breaks? Really, really. Because that's a good one there. I love my Louisiana cane breaks. They're not quite as high on the cultural icon for me as Louisiana milks, but cane breaks just as just as culturally prevalent in bayou areas, you know, kind of down in the basic habitat. of the rivers, floodplains is historically what they would have been living in.

As the name suggests, cane breaks, areas along rivers with large amounts of cane breaks. A lot of the ones that we see nowadays in my region in particular break. A lot of the rules that we've come to understand about rattlesnake movement and how they do with urbanization. And reflecting on some of the things that I've mentioned with other large snakes, their carrying capacity in smaller lots seems to be decently high across the board. So you can have almost urban rattlesnakes in Louisiana. You can have them living in the smallest,

most unconnected habits that possible and not just doing well, but potentially thriving across the board. So pain breaks, they tend to have every odd, that they would possibly want. Do you want some structure? You've got abandoned and dilapidated buildings that have fallen apart from hurricanes.

You want food. All of these agricultural fields and river floodplain habitats are just loaded with food. You want debris to move along during your spring and summertime movement. You've got tons of both human litter and hurricane litter just absolutely everywhere. every option that game breaks would want is down here. And because of that, they're active almost at all times of the year. I would say their least detectable time is probably the summer when they're going underground a little bit more. But wintertime actually tends to be my favorite time to see these guys, December, January, February,

because in a lot of these areas, they have zero long-term underground access. but our climate in South Louisiana is warm enough that they can stay above ground and even feed throughout the winter. So I found rattlesnakes with large meals in them right before some of our coldest cold snaps. One of my favorite pictures that I got pretty recently actually in 2025 was of a cane break rattlesnake during a snowstorm in Louisiana using an artificial set that was set for extreme cold temperatures. and not even a week and a half later that same snake was above ground, foraging, and just basking. So it was fully active within a week and a half after a snow event. So wintertime is my favorite time to observe them because they come back to their few overwintering sites. You know, a lot of the general behaviors are similar to their northern counterparts across the board.

but all the little southern factors come into play with pain break ecology and behavior that just makes them very successful species down here. So that's certainly a good one to get into. There's been a lot of other herpers and people in reptile media that have actually showcased the cane break, let's say, plentifulness of Louisiana across every corner of the state. you see these videos of people going into abandoned barns and checking some tin that's got like eight under it and it's just absurd numbers sometimes. So certainly a special species to get to see down here. Right. That's cool.

Very cool. Well, I think the last thing, and it's more of a western Louisiana, East Texas critter that I wanted to ask you before we hop into some of the other places you've been and is, man, buttermilk racers have to have the coolest phenotype of, you know, certainly of Caluber that are going. I'm curious if there are things that you've found regularly. If so, if you have thoughts on sort of their ontogenic change, any of this, any of that stuff. Yeah, so I will say this.

Ecologically, they're funny to me because they're pretty much just like all of our other racer snakes, how we have black masks east of them and black. racers everywhere else. They don't have very unique ecology. And they live across a wide variety of habitats. I've seen them in Long Lake Pine savannas. I've seen them in bayou areas. So as far as ecology is concerned, there's not too much to note. Their physiology is interesting because how many times will you see a white or partially white snake in nature? It's bizarre. They're these little mutants to me. And they don't necessarily seem as successful as the other racers.

But to me, that's one of the things that makes them kind of special. They're this very strange mutant of a racer snake that's surviving in East Texas and West Louisiana. One of their weirdest struggles is actually cancer. So if you find an older buttermilk racer, you tend to find them. They're very tumorous, and they tend to have a lot of issues. and I think somebody had told me this a while ago. I never fact-checked this, so you have to check me on this, but somebody was saying that the white coloration of buttermilks,

something physiologically with that means whenever they bask, they have less resilience to solar radiation, and they tend to be more susceptible to cancer, and that's why we see them with more tumors as they get older, why they darken and they get more tumors as they get older. So I don't know 100% if that's true or not, but I know that I've seen a lot of buttermilks with tumors. But yeah, they've got to be one of the most gorgeous racer snakes. I've seen some of the best-looking ones by far is whenever you get into integrate zones between

buttermilk black mask and buttermilk yellow-belly areas. Those are just some of the finest-looking racer snakes probably anywhere on the planet. Don't bother with the buttermilk-tanned overlap zones. You will get some of the ugliest racer snakes. I think the tan genetics definitely went out there. You get like a brown speckled racer with speckled brown. Like it's like brown on top of brown racer. But any area where you get yellow bellies and buttermilks overlapping,

those those have got to be some of my favorite snakes for sure those are just absolutely stellar but even the pure buttermilks are gorgeous very cool um another so i guess we'll transition into places you've been elsewhere you know outside outside that immediate area anyway um place after justin's heart arizona i know you have videos of fun and serves, helen monsters, a variety of cool things. Where all have you been? And kind of what are your favorite things to go looking forward? Do you plan to go back?

Any of those things? Yeah, so my favorite parts of Arizona against popular recommendation tends to be more central Arizona, where it just gets absolutely blazing hot. It's really nice whenever the monsoon season rolls around over there. the habitat. I'm just, I'm envious of the habitat they get out there. It's stunning.

It's vast. I don't have to think about road dynamics and, you know, habitat fragmentation when I go out there because it's just you get huge expanses of lowland deserts. It's some of my favorite region for sure. I like that even their somewhat protected species, you know, you get things like Heelomon monsters. And if you get into the right time and weather,

the old monsters are pretty plentiful. Certainly one of my favorite things to see out there. Some of my favorite people are certainly out in Arizona. Robin Nick, the Smet Logic crew, there are some absolutely stellar guys, and they've been herping out there for a long time. And they've got the knowledge on so much of that habitat. I will say, I think some of my favorite. snakes that I've seen from out there have probably been

Serbs. The black rattlesnakes are just my favorite western rattlesnakes that I've seen out there. I'm a bit of an invert fan at heart sometimes. You know, some of my first introductions to the natural world with inverts. And if you're a snake guy that also doesn't mind seeing some tarantula, scorpions, and giant desert centipedes, it's pretty stellar as well. But Arizona has treated, I don't think I've ever had a

trip to Arizona. I think every single time it's been an absolute blast seeing some of the best that the Southwest has to offer. We've been really lucky, too, you know, the people that have gotten to go with, you know, both from over here, some of my friends, close friends, and friends over there that have just been awesome to hang out with and learn from. Arizona has been a great experience. And I think as far as species to go back and see, man, thorn scrub hooknose snake has got to be the next on the list. So I'll probably spend the next 10 years not getting that one.

And whatever it happens, I'm going to have to pick a new excuse to go and visit Arizona. Right. Are you kind of a purist where you need to see it in Arizona? or would you be opposed to just going into Mexico and finding one a little easier? I'll certainly cheat. I will cheat all day long. I'll go to Mexico for thornscrubs. I'll go to Mexico for green rats.

I'll go to Mexico for brown vine snakes. I'll go for those South Arizona thorn scrub species in Mexico. I'll cheat a little bit. Yeah, maybe depending on the political or the safety aspect of Mexico. to go. I think Arizona, although you will see some things on the border of Arizona that are a little sketchy too. Yeah. Yeah. I'll say I do like a good herb challenge. I like those fringe habitats. I like that thorn scrub. She barely comes into the U.S. It's a really cool thing to see. I'm really glad that we have it in the U.S. and, you know, if I can spend hundreds of hours checking the

the Florida parishes of Louisiana for locally extirpated long leaf species. You know, I can, I can certainly run over to Arizona and do this for species that are actually still in the states. They just barely rang over. So I certainly love to spend more time on the Arizona side of the thorn scrub. That's for sure. Right. Yeah.

Yeah, I've spent a lot of hours looking up in trees, looking for those vine snakes. That's a kind of tedious. They are in the trees. That's certainly a learning curve out there, too, is seeing kind of how reptiles spend their days and spend their times because those small shrubs. Over here, we look at small shrubs, Yopal and Holly, and, you know, even sometimes palmettoes. And there's not a lot to look at. There's not a lot of reason for wildlife to use it. And then you get out to southwest and you've got, you know, those different mesquite bushes.

and then you've got your smaller scrub oaks. And that's structure. You know, out there, the above ground structure, it's almost like you're dealing with more of a tropical aspect, even though it's desert habitat. You're dealing with kind of tropical, you know, the vine snakes, typically that genus is going to be more tropical. You're going to have higher diversity in those groups as you move to the equator.

And they use trees. Same thing with your tropical. rattlesnake species. I find the blacktail rattlesnakes to be more similar to your Central American and South American rattlesnake species than even some more of the desert dwellers that we have in the

southwests. And they use the trees a good bit. They have that historic lineage of using that structure for survival. I think that's a really cool desert dynamic out there as well as that, you know,

you're hunting these shrubs that are five or six feet tall, but sure enough, there's going to be species in them. It's going to be some cool snakes. For sure. Absolutely. You had another video. You guys went to North Carolina. What was kind of the goal with that?

And what have you seen out that way? I don't need, so the goals, if I say that the goals were anything other than rainbow snake and mole king, I'd be lying. So I guess, I guess in that sense. I guess in that sense it was a major flop, but in all other senses, the trip was awesome. North Carolina is, gosh, it's like everything we do wrong here gets done right in North Carolina. There's so much expansive coastal habitat there.

It's just stellar. Obviously, one of the favorite things out there are going to be the Carol. line of pygmy rattlesnakes for a lot of people. But for me, my favorite thing that I want to look at were the coastal longleaf savannas, because they have old growth long leaf pine there. I mean, they've got 80 and 100-year-old long-leaf pine stands with some trees in them that are well above that, 150 years old. And seeing some of these monstrous trees on the, I mean, seeing a stump hole that I could jump into

and it be over my head was honestly one of the highlights of the trip to seeing these really well-structured habitats. And then on the coastal side, I mean, not to run through a marine bio 101 here, but they've got much better estuary systems for eels to get into the freshwater systems. So you have a higher density of your forensias. You have a higher density of both mud snakes and rainbow snakes. and it's really cool to see why. Down here, kind of along the Mississippi River Delta and along the Gulf Coast River Delta's, rainbow snakes are really struggling.

And it's hard for us to fully understand why at times until you look at the East Coast and you see everything that's going right for them in North Carolina. So North Carolina, some of my favorite habitat, once again, some of my favorite people. Once again, also flubbed on mole king, but got some really nice. chain king action out there. Kind of the classic looking Eastern King looks out there that I really, really love.

Apparently there's a learning curve to learn that there was a protected water snake species out there because I did have a moment where I was like, oh look, we've got a fasciata. That's really nice. I pick it up and my buddy's like, hey, you might want to put him down.

I'm like, why? He's like, that's a protected I'm like, you're telling me that this is a protected neurodia. And he goes, yes, I know that that was a protected neurodia. So let him off the road. And the next, we found they were everywhere. We found five or six Carolina water snakes. And the first two segments I tried to shoot, I tried laying down in front of them with the snake out in front.

And I was like, you know, this is a Carolina. And this isn't very efficient for trying to get a segment done. eventually we found one in the road that was just it stayed coiled up and I got a good two minute talking with it. But that was kind of funny to be like, huh, North Carolina has a protected water snake species. That's certainly interesting. Absolutely. It's good. It's good.

It had a really cool interaction with Lepidus out in West Texas, I think. It was the caught on film. Yeah, that was a fun morning. After all night of cruising, woke up in the morning, my dad did not want to go on a Lepidus hike with me after going so late. I was like, you know what? It's perfect temps. I'm going to head on up there. You know, we kind of had like a little West Texas Hurt gang together.

People from across the country were all just kind of hanging out talking about what they found the evening before. And I was like, I'm going to go hike this ridge over there. And they're like, for what? I'm like, I'm going to go see Leipides. And they're like, you're not going to see anything. It's right next to the hotel. and they're just like, you're not going to see anything up there. And it was really funny.

I probably got up there around 9 o'clock, so it's just starting to get really warm. I had my GoPro on, walked the whole top of the ridge, nothing there. And I walk it back and probably one of my favorite lepidus finds just perfectly cooled up out in the open. And I was like, man, I can't believe I missed that. I walked right past it, not even like five minutes ago. And I checked the GoPro footage back afterwards. I'm like, that snake was not there. It crawled out just in the amount of time that I took to walk by.

So I walked by maybe at, I don't know, 908, and then I walked back at maybe 913, and it was out. So sometime in that time frame, the temperature was perfect for him to come out and start basking. Got a really, really special moment there, got some great shots of that animal, really light phase lepidus too. but probably the lightest phase that I'd seen out there. And I guess the other highlight of that fine was going back down the hill and they're like, ah, did you see your lepidus? I was like, yeah, actually, it was the nicest lepidus I've seen all trip. And they're like, you're kidding.

Showing everybody pictures. And they're like, oh, we should have gone up there. They went up the next day and didn't see anything on the ridges. It was kind of funny. I felt very proud of myself for calling out lepidus that morning and then going, and you get a really nice lep during the day. It was a cool experience and just kind of went to show how you can be within just a few minutes of your species, especially out west. You know, you can walk the same ridge, the same cuts continuously and not see them.

And then 60 seconds later, there will be something there coming out of a hole that you didn't even see. So it's certainly a fun herping experience out there. And that was a cool learning experience as well to see just how close those times. timeframes can come. Right. Yeah, absolutely. And while we're on West Texas, I suppose it's always germane. What do you, so we have cruising versus hiking versus walking cuts and the joy that represents and that probably speaks to how I feel about it, but how do you feel about it? Gosh, so I didn't do a lot of cruising while we were out there. I can't speak to the efficiency of that. We did accidentally cruise

a few snakes just kind of on our way to places. We were inching to find some good hiking access. We really were. And eventually we found some on some private land, which was really cool. But there's really low hiking access. I mean, I guess for West Texas,

I'd have to say cuts are king. You know, you can go to the same cuts. And like I said, you can walk one all night and then 60 seconds later, one pops out of nowhere. So I think the specialty of West Texas is the cut. So I would say cut hiking would be my pick for out there.

Hmm. Mm-hmm. Fair enough. Well, as we're getting towards the end here, one of my favorite things to ask people about is Simus. So I'd love to hear about finding Simas either in Florida or Georgia, what that's looked like. Have you hiked one up yet and all that?

Yeah, so I usually have Simas. I usually have Southern Hog Nose on the brain. over here because very few people know this but simus used to range all the way to the florida parishes of louisiana and goodness i don't even think they were they might have been wiped out actually after world war two when we did our historic longleaf sale that actually ended up building a lot of world war two boats wiped out a lot of that louisiana southeast longlea kind of pushed them into the Mississippi domain. And one of the sites, actually, one of the fringe sites that I was talking about earlier

with the Tuophis was the last recorded region for Simus in the 60s for the state. So we've still, you know, we've still had many people hope beyond hope that Simus would reappear over here to no avail. I'm sure there's a little bit more hope on the Alabama side for things for that. but thymus are goodness they're sensitive but definitely a fun species to go and check out especially in those those really deep sandhills now i've only been over to their habitat in georgia once but i've seen their their habitat in florida plenty more times than that and you know october is definitely a great time to see them go out there in october cruise around

hike. But if you want to see a big cymus, if you want to see a big southern hog-nosed snakes, I think hiking early structure in March is probably the best way. I think some of the biggest cymus that I've ever seen people find have been more so in March, especially the adult females during that time. I love simus habitat. It's super, super sandy. And I've always wondered why you can get into areas where cymus are present and there's not going to be as many eastern hog nose, why you can get into areas where there's eastern hog nose and they were historically sinus, but now there's not. So definitely a lot more questions and answers on the sinus ecology side of things.

But I'll say this, nice, nice cool, low pressure weather events, really nice habitat. I guess my favorite thing with them is tracking them because my first solo Siamus ever actually hiked up. I went off trail. A friend of mine was just kind of going along cruising for him. And I went off and hiked. And my friend had actually never seen a Siamus before this moment. So he was trying to cruise for his first. And he was convinced that cruising was the way.

And while I was hiking very small sand trail, there was just a little straight line. just straight across the same. I was like, oh, that looks like a glass lizard because it's not a really defined slide like something else that I would expect to see out here.

That's got to be a glass lizard. And I followed it for a bit and it's a perfect batch of wiregrass. And just kind of looked under it and I just saw a couple of scales. I looked as a really nice little juvenile simus that had crossed the road. I called my buddy and I was like,

hey, we got a cymus that I just actually hiked up. So I'm partial to seeing a hiked one simply because of that track moment. I don't get to track snakes and sand too often because, like I said, we don't have a lot of sandhill over where I'm at. But I do like the fact that you can track them. And since that moment, I've been able to tell Stymish track versus other species a lot easier because they have their little inchworm movement on the sand, which is, it leaves a pretty distinct track compared to other. snake. So keep an eye out on the sands if you're hoping to see simus. And definitely a species of concern when it comes to environmental factors, disease, parasites, things like that. So

always tell people be be extra, extra sensitive and careful with our little cymus because they're one that we don't know a lot about still. That's for sure. Absolutely. Mentioned a couple times here. What, if anything, your plans for the YouTube channel going forward? So currently with Life's Wild Adventures, the LWA kind of Productions group that we've got going here, we're leaning more towards production of ecology through the eyes of these reptiles. So we're really hoping to present reptiles from a larger scale, kind of the way we started this conversation as to what's happening. So we're trying to tell the story, whether we're telling the natural history or we're telling the conservation story,

we'd like to be able to give some of these animals a really good podium to which to speak on. We can tell their story both visually as well as from my experiences with them. And really, that's what we're looking to do is promote reptile conservation through education, through these motivating experiences. Hopefully things that people, when they watch it, it's something that will be moving to them, something that they're not just like, oh, wow, you know, I want to see one of those too,

you know, because that's a common thing. It's like, yeah, I want to see that. So this is cool. Or, oh, wow, those are really good shots. We really want people to fall, just absolutely fall in love with these animals, you know, not only do we want people to enjoy them in the wild and get to see them.

And that's why conservation, is such a big deal to where we can keep seeing these animals in the wild. Make people go, wow, this is incredible. I want to keep seeing them. I want everybody to enjoy these animals the way I do. What's something that we can do to improve this experience or what's something that we can do to maybe make it to where these animals are more accessible, make it to where these animals are less likely to be extirpated from a lot of these areas.

You know, so many people have to drive hours and hours and hours just to go see one area where these animals can be. And that's not how it's supposed to be. We're supposed to have habitat virtually all around us at this stage. So I think pushing for that habitat conservation, pushing for that restoration narrative on the side of the reptiles with the reptiles of the focus, we have some really fun videos that I'm working on right now that we have upcoming. We have a really cool diamond back production that we're working on.

We actually have, I guess if I think about it, we have two. two diamond back productions going on. We have Diamondback rattlesnake and we have Diamondback Terrapins coming up soon. We have quite a few Florida species that we're looking to showcase and document a little bit better, maybe tell some of the stories of some of those bossorial species. And then on the ecology side of things, showing species interactions. One of my favorite species out west that we're hoping to feature one day is Cucalata. So we're hoping to see the Big Bend blackheaded snakes.

document some of their unique ecology. Of course, because we're never going to get to document a Rimrock Crown Snake, or at least if we do, that'll be probably the last thing that I ever filmed. But there's certain species that maybe don't need the conservation telling, but maybe just their ecology needs a little bit of extra focus and a little bit more appreciation. Right. You know, Big Ben Blackhead snakes are my favorite snakes out in West Texas. And I'm like, man, these things are underrated.

It's a giant tantilla that eats a giant. desert centipedes? Why are people more fans of these? Yeah. So I think individual conservation project and narrative storytelling with these animals, while also having that appreciation. I think that's something that Steve Irwin just absolutely mastered in his productions with crocodile hunter, got a lot of young people involved in reptiles and conservation, really just animal love. And it's something that I think a lot of other media has gotten pieces and parts for us. right, but maybe not the full experience that people are really looking for with wildlife content.

So there's a lot to be figured out there, but we're hoping to expand the story of reptiles, the story of what makes them so special and why I fell in love with them in the first place, why other reptile and snake enthusiasts have fallen in love with these animals. Hopefully we can kind of not only expand people's general understanding, but also just improve the field as a whole. So the channel is definitely aiming up and out when it comes to, you know, improved media. We're hoping to not lose any of the core values that make it what it's done, you know, just absolutely raw going out there, enjoying nature, but also we're going to be looking a little bit closer than we've looked in the past with a lot of these species.

Another thing, I guess I'll have a question to ask y'all before we end this because we have an interesting production coming up, which will be the every single king snake iceberg. We're going to cover every single lampropelta species in the world. And I wanted to ask, what would be y'all's top three lamprepeltus species? That's a, that's a tough one. It can be regional variants subspecies, kind of just throw in the, you know, throw in the lamprepeltus lore and knowledge. I've always had a soft,

spot for the the uh california kings the especially the black and white kind of desert variants i love those things um nabalakai are really beautiful you know depending on how you feel about nblock i get it oh my god they're they're they're gorgeous i mean there's just so many cool lamps um i i love the you know utah mountain kings they're they're probably my my favorite tricolor i just really enjoy those those would be mine I would say some of the nicest Mountain King pictures I've ever seen were Utah Mountain King. So I'd say it's a pretty good pick. Yeah.

Rob, do you have any different one? Well, I'd have to agree with you on those Utah Mountain Kings between the ones that we've seen, you know, across various trips there, you know, and that one that you found as we're hiking down into the Grand Canyon. So the, you know, North Rim, so it makes it in for La Bialis, you know. Yeah. Really, really cool. Um, Zanada certainly are sort of, um, they're the charismatic, right, the known charismatic entity with their classic form and function. Speckle kings are really cool, you know.

Okay. As you say, the Getsula, you know, we saw a first Getsula up in New Jersey and, you know, really cool. Yeah. And Colorado, you know, Western milk snakes here in Colorado, preening, too. So that's four, I guess. Very nice. Those, those are definitely some, some good picks.

I would have to, I would say that those are solid, and I'll, I guess, give a little bit of a spoiler. Those are going to be ranked pretty high up there. Although for all my alternate lovers, they're going to be, they're going to be slightly disappointed in my alternative opinions. They might, they might throw a couple of bricks through my windows at my house once I put some of these other species a little bit higher than Alternate. Right. I'll teach their own, you know what I mean? Yeah. Being out in West Texas, we are alternate less on three trips.

Yeah, they might be higher on our list if we could find them. Yeah. There's certainly a cool one, that's for sure. Yeah. Have you found them? I got to see one actually fairly recently. And, you know, it was probably about the other. You know, he didn't have a lot of red, but, you know, once again, still a special snake.

I love the fact that they look like lepidus in a lot of areas. You know, you kind of get that. that classic lamper pelts, venomous snake mimicry going on there. But, you know, I definitely, when it comes to lamps of West Texas, I certainly am itching for a West Texas milk snake. Those things are just glowing out there.

You know, love the gray bandits. They're cool, but when it comes to other lamps, I don't know, I guess I'm just a fan of the milks a lot of the times. Yeah. I think the only thing that puts the milk slower on my list is you got to flip for them in Utah. You can walk up the Mountain King. Yeah, I guess that's true.

You can see them doing their thing a little bit better if that makes sense. Yeah. Well, you know, as we're basically at the end here, we'll give Justin the barest echo of a fight. What makes possums the coolest pets? Oh, goodness. They're awesome. They're awesome. The thing that's,

the one thing that's not great about them is they don't live long, but everything else about them is just hilarious. It's like owning a really, really dumb cat. I guess it's the best way to put it. People like their cats, but some of them are a little bit too smart for their liking, and some of them are a little bit too wary. Possum's like a, Possum's like a cat that just doesn't know what's going on.

You know, America's only marsupial. And they're one that people end up with a lot. For people that maybe haven't seen the channel, we had a possum for a few years, Momo. And goodness, that was just such a special animal. He got a lot of, goodness, I got so many people that just, they were like, I love Momo. How do I get into wildlife rehabilitation?

I'm like, wow, he was the best, he was the best flagship animal that we've ever had on the channel. One possum, you know, he's, I've had people say, I stopped killing him in my yard, because of MoMA. So, possums are definitely a special one because it's when people interact with a lot. And they don't really get to know possums well until you get to have hands on with one that actually likes you and wants to hang around you. But yeah, I would say the fact that they're a really dumb cat as far as their hardware goes is probably the most entertaining part of having a possum. So those would be my reasons. They might not be the most sound reasons, but those are some of mine. Yeah, so definitely an interesting animal, you know, and their biology and just really quirky nature is pretty cool.

I think I had a similar experience with a badger where rehabilitated bats. Badger, they, you know, had it. And it was just like sitting on the guy's lap. You could go up and pet it. Oh, man. It was so cool. I'm like, I want a badger. That's a little sentient brick right there.

It's just a brick of meat. It's just pure muscle digging power. I mean, that's a cool animal. I love badgers. Yeah, there was a recent video of somebody that found a young one that either its mom had run away and gone down a burrow or something, but they, you know, were playing with it. And then it ran down the borough as well. Oh, man, that's awesome. Yeah.

And it just kept going up to him. Like, they picked it up or like, and it wasn't trying to be aggressive. I'm like, that's cool. Oh, that's a trip. Yeah. Goodness. Yeah, I'd pay a lot of money to have a baby badger to be my friend. That's a cool animal for sure.

Yeah. I like the mustelids a lot. They're cool. Cool. Well, yeah, such great. information and really great to have you on and hear about your research and your findings. Just really great stuff. We really appreciate you coming on.

Let's shout out your YouTube channel again. It's the name of it. Yeah, so it's LWA, Life's Wild Adventures on YouTube. Try to post every single Saturday. And a lot of it's going to be pretty herb-centric. So if you like some depth on especially southeastern species, but all, U.S. species of snake, all various herps, you know, go check it out and definitely give me some feedback. I'm always looking for feedback from people that are more into the herb community and

into the reptile community as a whole. You know, it's meant for everybody, but definitely we want that specialized feedback for sure as we're, as we're making content. That's cool. Yeah, it looks like it goes back about eight years. You've been doing it for a while. Yeah, Oh, goodness. Yeah. Goodness. Yeah, it's, it's been quite some time. We're getting back to more, more consistent posting this year. I had a little bit of a hiatus over the last eight months, and this next batch of content is rolling out from now till July, and then we got some more productions planned from May till June. So hopefully some special stuff coming up. That's awesome. Yeah, I've got a backlog. I've got to check out.

So, yeah. that's awesome yeah i mean it is tricky to keep something going consistently like that yeah i'm lucky i got me here yeah like like y'all said snakes are anything but consistent from a scientific standpoint and let alone uh media production you'll right find finding them when you got when you got a nice video playing together they don't always want to work with you on that so some some videos go scripted but unmade for many years. Yep.

You got to have the animal to kind of make them exciting, right? That's how do you, how do you kind of balance that fine line between, you know, the sensationalism and, you know, the algorithm of YouTube, getting people to see your videos and, you know, like just basically good wildlife content? It seems like it's hard to have that happen.

Yeah, absolutely is. One thing that I tell a lot of people, animals certainly are sensational. You know, the reason that so many people love them is because they're just incredible to so many different points. And like everything that we're talking about right this second, like if I had to make an elevator pitch to what species is interesting to you, you'd have a certain list of characteristics. You know, maybe it's rarity, maybe it's color. Maybe it's their lifestyle, what they eat, what they do. but if I was going to make a pitch or like to say cotton miles you know there's lots of different ways that we can talk about cotton miles from a media standpoint we can talk about how common they are

and how people should interact with them we can talk about other similar species so that's one of my very popular videos was cotton mouths versus water snakes how to tell the difference right there's all these different angles that you can take and you know it's important to navigate which ones are reasonable and beneficial, right? So like as you said before, there's a lot of overhype and a lot of clickbait when it comes to a lot of these animals, especially snakes of all creatures. You know, people really overuse snakes. And it's important to find the stories that need to be told and the topics that people are

going to really like. And obviously some, you know, not all topics are created equal from a media standpoint, even if we love all these animals, certain species are going to go. a longer way. So if I'm going to present, let's say, an Eastern Diamondback rattlesnake, there's a lot to work off of here. There's the conservation capacity to work with them. There's the venom capacity. There's them being the largest rattlesnake species in the world. There's their urban interactions, you know, in places where they might need to be relocated. There's their interactions with other people's animals like cattle and dogs. That's a topic there.

There's also topics of comparative analysis. So you can do a topic comparing rattlesnake species. That was one of our more recent videos was covering all the rattlesnake species in the world. And you can take these different angles. You know, that's not necessarily this outrageous thing to do from an animal perspective. You're not putting them in a bad light and you're not putting them at risk to the public eye. But it's like, oh, man, how many species are there of rattlesnake? Because most people wouldn't think about that.

So there's interesting topics to tell. And then at the same time with individual animals and individual locations, there's stories to be told with these species. So we balance it based on the goals of not only the channel being conservation through education. We also balance that on an individual basis. So there's some species that I tend to try to steer clear of covering in more depth because I don't think that they necessarily need that full on spotlight from the public view on them. but then there's other species that we're like we really need people to know about these we need their story to be more known there's lots of different topics and then sometimes the goal is just to help people interact with them better so i do cotton mouth and copperhead videos quite often and it's just

showing people the different facets of interacting with them you know copperheads are really camouflaged here are some things you can do to keep them from being around your property and stepping on you know remove your tin piles remove your piles of logs unless you're a herper in which case do exactly this right here to get some more snakes on your property. So there's lots of different great stories to be told that don't necessarily need to be overhyped. You know, you don't need to do anything dangerous with these animals. There doesn't need to be any of this hurrah that wouldn't naturally occur. There's already this natural joy with working with these animals.

There's already this natural hype that's built around working with them. And you don't have to antagonize them to get incredible behavior. You can get incredible behavior from both your regular interactions and just with watching the snakes interact with their environment in general. I think a documentary that really showcased that well was Steve Irwin's original, 10 most venomous snakes in the world. And you hear that topic and you're like, oh, this is going to be like insane and he's going to wrangle every single one of them.

But if you watch the documentary, it's actually a slower pace. than people might think it was because it starts with him getting one out of an engine, the Eastern Brown out of an engine. But then he goes, this is what people see with these snakes. They're grumpy, they're cranky, and they're stuck somewhere they're not supposed to be. But that's not the true nature of these animals. I'm going to show you guys. Watch, we're going to check out the 10 deadliest species in the world.

And then he goes and he switches your expectations by. He goes and he shows them in these calm settings. and the most extravagant thing that we see is probably the behavior of these animals when they're left alone, where it's an eastern brown chasing down a mouse and grabbing it. It's a Taipei living in the most barren habitat imaginable. It's a death adder doing a caudal lure and attracting a skink and eating it. So he slows down the expectations. And even though he was quite extreme in his showcases across the board,

the most extreme thing that he showed was the behavior and the natural beauty of these animals. And that's something that I certainly try to focus on across the board. So you have to have that hands-on element. There has to be that human hands-on connectivity with these animals. At the same time, there has to be an understanding of natural behavior and the intrinsic value of these animals. And sure, like I said, a ribbon snake is not going to have the same appeal as something like an Eastern Diamondback rattlesnake. But, you know, if we're talking about snakes and postal regions, you know, we can always flip these other more underrated species in there, get a little bit of extra species ID and education, give these less charismatic species, their moments to shine. Or maybe you just find very creative ways to tell their stories.

You know, who's to say that ribbon snakes don't have very special things that can be discussed and talked about? There's probably a ribbon snake expert out there in the world some way that could. do a one-hour documentary on the species. Right. And just be like, look, you know, we can talk about the taxonomy. We can talk about, you know, the early developments of venom through salivary glands with garter snake groups. There's all kinds of things that you can cover.

It just takes a lot of depth and a lot of passion. And I think that's the biggest focus with the channel is to bring in that genuine passion for reptiles and for snakes and then for their conservation across the country. And that's something that we're going to continue to focus on and improve how we present that information to both the public. And in a way that, you know, people that are really into the field are like, oh, this is just the same rigamarole every time. Like, I want to, I want to have some of that specialty locale information and some of those special shots. But about every single video that the experts can also really appreciate, but we can also reach a wider audience and get people to appreciate and not demonize these animals. Because, you know, like I said, most people still don't really like snakes.

So we've got to uphill battle and getting people that are not kill very special animals some days. Right. Well, that was about the best answer I could have hoped for nicely done. We're bad at 100. Steve would be proud. That's cool. I got to have dinner with his dad once.

Really? Bob Irwin. Yeah, we went out too. No kidding. property and he yeah he fed us in his house and yeah that's a trip go release some coastal carpet pythons back in the wild that was pretty cool yeah so just kind of an aside oh that's an absolute dream yeah that's hey that that is the origin of that all the the early uh crocodile uh crocodile uh crocodile handling protocol and all of the early uh how not to get

bit by Eastern Brown. How not to die to a venomous snake 101 was Bob. I think how to how to make them international icons was 111. I guess that's the course that Steve really mastered. But I mean, Bob had all the core values down that he transferred. That's awesome. That's an honor. That's really cool.

It was pretty cool. Yeah. And it would have been a little very cool to meet him as well. but yeah, it was definitely cut too short as life. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Well, again, you know, thanks so much for coming on and sharing the wealth of knowledge. And yeah, everybody go check out Life's Wild Adventures and see the videos and support, you know, such a great move to educate and entertain, I guess, or show us the lives of these amazing animals.

So thanks again for coming on. And we'll go ahead and thank our, oh, Rob, you have, oh, we'll go ahead and thank our MPR crew, and thanks for their support here. And we'll catch you next week for Reptile Fight Club.