Camping and a Lucky Find!

ekoostikBoa · #1 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 03:33 AM

I went to an AWESOME campground/music festival last weekend at a place called Nelson Ledges Rock Quarry in Ohio (Nelson Ledges Quarry Park) for a Classic Rock fest. If you're into Zeppelin, and are on the East Coast, make it your top goal to see the tribute band Kashmir (Kashmir)!!! They ROCKED!! And they had the look and sound DOWN!
So, we went for a hike around the quarry which is now a lake when my girlfriend heard a noise. She looked where she heard it, and sure enough a garter had just grabbed a frog! I've only seen two other garter snakes in the wild, and that's about it for my herp finds in nature so this was very cool to come across!!! I was lucky enough to have my camera on me, and I got some pictures and a video. Here's the pics, I'll try to find a way to post the video hopefully!

The snake had the frog by one rear leg to start. The whole time the snake looked like it was huffing and puffing its body to much bigger than I think it really was! The frog pretty much just sat motionless, letting out a cry (unfortunately for the emotion in me, but we did not interfere). The snake got the other leg for about 3-5 minutes, but the frog managed to get that leg free and struggled for about 30sec.-1 minute but the snake held on to the one leg. From there the snake kept repositioning itself in every way it could to get a good grip on the second leg and succeeded after about 15 minutes. The snake got up to the "waist" of the frog, maybe a bit further, as you can see in the last pictures, and then took off under a bush. I don't know if the flight was a natural thing or the result of the group of about 10-15 people that had joined to watch the event. Hope ya'll find this interesting, let me know if you have any questions! I won't br able to respond soon as I'm off to Wisconsin tomorrow morning to see Phish!!!!! I'll get back though!

angrybananapeel · #2 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 03:37 AM

pretty wild.

Icicle · #3 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 03:46 AM

Wow.

ekoostikBoa · #4 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 03:53 AM

Anybody else come across a snake feeding in the wild? My thoughts just after seeing it were "What are the chances of ever being within 50-100 foot of a snake feeding in the wild, let alone being able to see it!" What followed was awesome too, I'm into fishing so it was really cool... We came across a bass that cornered about 20-30 baby perch into a small pool and had just struck at them as we walked up! I'm in love with Nelson Ledges!

John · #5 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 06:07 AM

Neat find! Great pictures. Thanks for sharing.

Adrya · #6 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 06:25 AM

Crazy. Just this Monday I came across a large garter snake eating a toad the exact same way. Except the toad peeping a few times on the way down made it kinda heartbreaking to watch. I also got pics.

Special K · #7 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 06:30 AM

This is really neat; I'd never find something like that! Thanks for sharing.

AGActaeonia · #8 (**permalink**) 06-20-2009, 07:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reccaant

I went to an AWESOME campground/music festival last weekend at a place called Nelson Ledges Rock Quarry in Ohio

My friends and I go camping there all the time.

tokaysrnice · #9 (**permalink**) 06-22-2009, 12:20 AM

Cool man, I love seeing snakes do snake things. I have a couple photos of snakes feeding one is a gopher eating a fence lizard the other is a garter eating a mouse. Really cool to observe them in the wild.

Nate

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