Herpetofauna: One Life's List

Pantherophis emoryi emoryi
Great Plains Rat Snake

Val Verde Co., Texas. May 20, 1999

As sunset approached we watched the two thunderheads build to the north of us and then collide as they moved southward, directly overhead.  It was a thunderstorm the likes of which I've never witnessed.  The rain came down in torrents, there were lightning strikes every few seconds and the thunderclaps were immediate and immense. We pulled over and stopped to wait it out. A deer or some other large ungulate slammed into the back of our vehicle and then ran on into the darkness.

After a hour hour or so the storm moved on south over the Mexican hills and the rains stopped.  Continuing on, a snake appeared in our headlights, lying in the middle of a road tranformed into a waterway.  It was this Great Plains Rat Snake, apparently flushed out of its underground hideaway by the downpour. As we jumped out to secure it, we could hear Spadefoots and Gulf Coast Toads start to call far away in the dark.

It was a happy moment for me - I had looked for this snake in Missouri, and had only managed to find two road-killed specimens. Many years ago I also found a DOR near Columbia, Illinois.  In the desert these snakes hide underground in all manner of cracks and crevices during the day, coming out at night to hunt for prey.