The passionate and extreme interest in this species from Kentucky’s limited and mostly isolated populations leads many interested parties to consider efforts to locate specimens. I offer a warning based on my decades of experiences. Be prepared and committed to make the ultimate sacrifices and resign yourself to pain and failure. After successful documentation of our Cave Region specimen I calculated the costs at being in excess of $15,000.00 which included the loss of a truck used in the process of survey. This does not include the hours of time spent or anything other than the money spent on gas, materials, etc. The discovery of the shed above cost in excess of $20,000.00 not including hours spent and other costs. Since producing this record I have been without my truck for over three weeks as the exploded engine only 6000 miles over warranty is being replaced. My wife is furious, my children see less of their father, my field partner is frustrated with the delays, and our survey efforts for 2018 have come to a halt.

To those willing to go beyond the deli cups, choose a common species of snake that is readily found and for which ample data can be collected and studied. The nature of how the processes works for subjects such as this one are not for those who lack the willingness to put their interests in every other aspect of life to the grinding wheel as they look oblivion and desperation in the eye while refusing to blink as everything else they care about is lost and destroyed.

Cast skin from Mammoth Lake specimen of Pituophis melanoleucus photo by Will Bird


Northern Pine Snake gallery photo by user justinian2120