Herpedex: All the Herps I Have Seen In The Wild: Garter Snakes On UIUC Campus

Date:
March 16th 2015

Species Found:

Plains Garter Snake (Thamnophis radix)

Background:

From the first week of college in August 2014, I had heard about the elusive Garter Snakes that apparently lived right in the middle of campus. Many people had stories about these snakes jumping out of the bushes and scaring students or about the snakes getting into buildings and creating problems. Fewer people had actually got pictures of them or knew how to find them. Throughout my first semester at UIUC, I must have made 10-15 trips to the small strip of land between Engineering Hall and Boneyard Creek where people had seen these snakes before. I had found about a dozen shed skins but no snakes.

Shed Skin of Plains Garter Snake: PC Yatin Kalki

Spring had arrived and we had had at least 4 days of warm weather. It was a new semester and a new season so I decided to try and find these snakes again.

The Trip:

I checked for basking snakes on the sunny rocks that ran alongside the creek but found nothing. I checked on all the sunny rocks that were in between the building and the creek and found nothing. When I was just about to give up, I thought of checking the shady rocks that were right behind the building. To my surprise, there were 2 medium sized Garter Snakes coiled up and resting out in the open on some large, flat rocks. Tristan was supposed to meet me there to help me look for them but I had found them before he even got there. I picked one up and left the other one there for Tristan to get his 'in situ' photograph. He arrived soon after and we started taking photos.