Re: errr..ole-timer...

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Posted by oldherper on April 08, 2003 at 22:47:26:

In Reply to: errr..ole-timer... posted by regalringneck on April 08, 2003 at 20:43:54:

Yeah, it's semantics. What I really said was extending the KNOWN range, as in updating the range maps to show that these animals occur in a wider range than previously documented. And, you are correct..private property is just that. But the property in question, as I understand it, is State property. IF it is shown that Texas Indigos occur in the surrounding areas as well, then maybe some of that property can be purchased by the state to afford more protection.

:Perhaps its just a matter of semantics....but to EXTEND the range...one would have to recover or introduce the guardians to suitable but unoccupied habitat. Me thinks this appears to be a case of discovering what has likely long been the case; that the guardians can make a go of it in the periphery of the Hill country, now the $100.-? is where else are they in the Hill country?
:& as long as Tejas is nearly wholey private property, none of this is going to extend to this habitat a whit of additional protection, which is how it should be on private property IMO....if we want to preserve private property for wildlife...we need to ante up... & via a "Conservation easement"...this doesnt have to be exorbitant :)
:C &B; jg

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::I think it's great that the known range for a species (especially a Drymarchon) is actually possibly being EXTENDED. I also agree that the Texas wildlife (of Fish and Game, or whatever they call themselves in Texas) folks need to look into the possibility of officially extending the range to forestall any development (read: destruction) of that habitat.

:::A birder sent me this photo of a Texas Indigo he took this weekend. What is so remarkable about this photo is that it was taken at Lost Maples State Park in NW Bandera County, TX.

:::While indigos have been recorded in the counties directly south and east of Bandera county, what makes this record so interesting is the habitat. This snake is from well within the central TX hill country. Further south, the habitat changes abruptly (in a matter of a few hundred yards in some areas) from Tamaulipan scrub in the south (indigo country) to steep shady wooded ravines. Indigos aren't known to occur in this habitat (other than a few individual records at the transition).

:::This snake was found in an area of steep heavily wooded hillsides and and rocky ravines probably 40 miles from any "suitable" habitat. This is Elaphe bairdi and subterranean Central Texas salamanders country. To see an indigo snake here is really astonishing compared to their usual flat, relatively arable plains further south. And even where they occur further west into Val Verde county, they are usually associated with open scrub, not steep, dark ravines like those in Lost Maples!

:::I frankly didn't believe his post when I read it, until he sent me the pics!
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There are already 2 fed endangered species there...... chrish 04/09/03 (0)