Rehydrating and cooling off in the air conditioned gas n' grab, we plotted our next move.  Railroad tracks are usually a good bet for herps; in short order we found ourselves clambering up an embankment near a railroad overpass.  Dav found the first snake - a nice looking Osage Copperhead (Agkistrodon contortrix phaeogaster). It was great to see an Osage again after a long dry spell, about fifteen years for me.

We split into two groups, for a while, to our benefit.  Dav, Jim, Jeff and Ken turned up a juvenile Osage, one of last year's neonates.  Rick, Tracey, Steve and I headed the other way a bit and found a Redsided Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis).   This was a species very high on my 'wish list' for this trip.  This parietalis was a fair-sized female, opaque and probably gravid from the looks of her.  After the usual flattening, musking and biting anything in reach, we took pictures and I put her back where we found her.

We were heading off the railbed and getting ready to move on when Dav discovered a flat tire on his Jeep.  A very nice couple who lived next to the tracks helped us out by filling up the tire and pointing Dav to a garage where he could get the tire patched.  While we were waiting for Dav to get back, the folks told us about a quarry about a half-mile up the tracks the other way.  We decided to go check it out.  On the way we managed to find another Great Plains Narrowmouth and two male Redsided Garters under railroad ties along the roadbed.  Bless those railroaders everywhere for tossing their old ties off to the side!  I got a fair shot of the Narrowmouth engaging in the 'unken reflex' - limbs splayed out and held rigid, the body stiff and held in an upwards curve.

Der Unken Froggie

The quarry proved to have little in the way of rocks or other debris to check under, but we did turn up another Copperhead under a railroad tie.  We walked back to the vehicles, and the nice couple told us of another site nearby, with some abandoned buildings.  The man lead us there in his truck, and we fanned out to work the grounds around an abandoned general store.  Jim found a nice looking racer that desperately wanted to latch onto his nose.  A couple of Ringnecks and Redsided Garters turned up and another Ornate Box, the second of the day.

That was it, the end of the first day, ending as the light was failing and our stomachs rumbling.  By all accounts it was a very productive and satisfying day of herping.

Ornate Box Turtle (Terrapene ornata ornata)
Prairie Racerunner (Cnemidophorus sexlineatus viridis)
Great Plains Skink (Eumeces obsoletus)
Northern Prairie Skink (Eumeces septentrionalis septentrionalis)
Ground Skink (Scincella laterale)
Eastern  Collared Lizard (Crotaphytus collaris collaris)
Prairie Ringneck Snake (Diadophis punctatus arnyi)
Black Rat Snake (Elaphe obsoleta obsoleta)
Eastern Yellowbellied Racer (Coluber constrictor flaviventris)
Intergrade Milk Snake (Lampropeltis triangulum syspila X gentilis)
Lined Snake (Tropidoclonion lineatum)
Northern Water Snake (Nerodia sipedon sipedon)
Redsided Garter Snake (Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis)
Osage Copperhead (Agkistrodon contortrix phaeogaster)
Blanchard's Cricket Frog (Acris crepitans blanchardi)
Great Plains Narrowmouth Toad (Gastrophryne olivacea)
Plains Leopard Frog (Rana blairi)