remote juvenile Water Snakes

[Fred Schueler]

Everyone,

I just did the streets, and found 2 crisp dead-on-road juvenile Water
Snakes. This continues a pattern I've seen over the years of baby Water
Snakes being found much farther from water than the adults.

This makes a dozen juveniles we've found on the doing-the-streets
transect since 2004, with no adults found. There is a population of
adults in the creek, 400m away, which we see at the bridge in the
village, and from 2012-2022, peaking in 2021, we did have adults at our
pond about 550m from the creek, in the spring, as if they were
hibernating there, but we haven't seen any for the past 3 springs
(doubtless a trigger for seeing some there when I next go up to the pond).

Asking google about this juvenile terrestriality, the AI gives - "They
tend to inhabit lower-order streams near larger water bodies, which
helps them avoid predators like birds and fish. Juveniles are also known
to hide in dense cover and hunt for prey" - but none of the articles
mentions an early non-aquatic life stage, so I suppose I ought to write
it up.

fred.
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Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad
Fragile Inheritance Natural History - https://fragileinheritance.ca/
2024 annual letter: https://clt1233162.bmeurl.co/11E63979
6 St-Lawrence Street Bishops Mills, RR#2 Oxford Station, Ontario K0G 1T0
on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44.87156° N 75.70095° W
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