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Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by Phobos on January 18, 2005
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Well everyone..It's over but will never be forgotten.
I wish to thank the organizers and Loma Linda University for just an awesome few days of science. I have been to many scientific conferences but never one better than this one.
Todays main topics was mostly ecology and conservation of Rattlesnakes. The following were tidbits regarding one of my favorite R/S C. horridus
You may not want to keep your attention on the ground, since many investigator have found them 3 meters (~9 feet)up in trees. One inverstigator looking at the ground, turned around and found himself FACE to FACE (4 inches from)with a Timber!!!! He did not get tagged, very lucky guy. I know a NY State Trooper that collected Timbers. One day while out in the field he was tagged in the ELBOW by a Timber he never saw till it got him.
If you have a brood of newborn timbers keep them all together till feeding. I know, not what I would normally do but this investigator kept them all in seperate cages but could not get them to feed. When he put them all back into the origional cage and dropped in a mouse it turned into a "shark feeding frenzy". The mouse was hit multipule times from 8 different snakes. He had to quickly kill and introduce many mice to make them all happy.
Timbers have an average of 8 babies every other year if conditions are good.
Timbers seem to mate much later in the summer than I thought. They don't mate after just emerging from hibernation, they just disperse to their summer ranges. The male track down the females to mate in July/August. It subsequently has a very short gestational period since they drop their young in Sept/Oct.
That's all on the Timber I will share for now.
In one population of C. v. viridus had summer range for some snakes up to 22 KM (~13 miles) out and 22 KM back to the den site. Most R/S summer range is just a few miles.
Many conservation measures are going on to save Rattlesnakes from extinction but not many investigator think it will be completely successful, too little-too late. Captive breeding and releasing the neonates at a den site just does not work. Very few neonates survive the first year. Many populations are isolated by roads/development, thus have no fresh DNA to keep the gene pool from stagnation and eventual extinction.
Habitat distruction is really taking it's toll. In CT one developer built a house right smack-dab on an active Timber Den site. Now for most of us that's sort of cool but 99% of home owners would not and you know exactly what would happen. Sometimes,as it was mentioned at the conference, People with crow-bars would attach a den as the snakes emerge and pull it apart, killing every snake they found.
What can we do to help these snakes survive in the wild? Well I'll say it; but it won't be popular:
DON'T COLLECT WILD SNAKES!! There are enough captive bred snakes available for collectors to keep.
Cheers!
Al
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by Phobos on January 18, 2005
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One more thought.
If you missed this one there are no plans to have another one for a while, since science is a slow process; it will take a few years for new data to be collected & analyzed.
Al
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by ALA_herp31 on January 19, 2005
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Hey Al, thanks for keeping us up to date on the topics of the symposium, maybe next time around me and my fiancé can make it to Loma Linda “I hope”. Well, good job on keeping those of us that could not go, up to date. Thanks again Al, have a good one.............Be safe, Wally
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by KingCobraFan on January 19, 2005
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What about a "Biology of the Elapids" Symposium? Maybe throw in pit vipers other than rattlers? Just a thought.
Bill Huseth
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by ALA_herp31 on January 19, 2005
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Sounds like a good idea to me Bill, I would like to see a Symposium on the Agkistrodon’s myself “figures huu? Would be nice to see some well known Herpers speak on the natural lives and habits of the Pit Vipers in the Southeast, such as (Agkistrodon piscivorous) and (Agkistrodon contortrix) wouldn’t it? (just a suggestion of corse), I guess I may be a little indifferent for my favorite Species “cant help myself tho “LOL”. Maybe we can talk some of the Herpers that study this Genera, into getting something like this started ............Be safe ya’ll, Happy herping, Wally
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by Phobos on January 20, 2005
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Hi Guys:
They had one a few years ago called Biology of Pit Vipers we just missed them :-(
Elapids; Maybe not in this country since they are under represented by wild populations.
Cheers,
Al
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RE: Biology of Rattlesnakes Day Three
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by Snakeman1982 on January 21, 2005
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Excellent posts. Glad you got to go. I debated about going but figured that since I was already missing over a week of school for my recent Bolivia trip that I shouldn't miss another week for the symposium. I know a few of the speakers there but it would have been awesome to meet and hear some of the others there.
Yes, there were two previous symposiums "Biology of the Pitvipers" and "Biology of the Vipers". Both have books out from the symposium and I highly recommend both if you can get them. Can't wait till the "Biology of the Rattlesnakes" book comes out. Should be pretty good. I think these "specialist" symposium are occuring about once every 5 or 6 years. So maybe the "Biology of the Bothrops" or "Trimeresurus" or something will be come out next. Though I do think Cobras or Australian elapids would be interesting as well.
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