D.O.R. Bullsnake Pituophis catenifer sayiDriving down a dark county road seemingly in the middle of nowhere I stumbled upon a 7 ft Bullsnake (Pituophis catenifer sayi) that was dead on the road (DOR). I was with my friend Bernd Skubowius at the time and we were both astonished at the size of the snake. It is unlikely the car that hit it didn’t see it, such a behemoth was visible from quite a distance. Nevertheless, because of the stigma associated with snakes people often don’t stop or go around them. On another occasion I found a gravid Gulf-Coast Ribbon snake (Thamnophis proximus orarius) that was also a DOR, as per my usual I collected it along with several other ribbon snakes that night. I later learned, that one was of record size and the other had a record number of neonates! We published these findings to increase our knowledge of Gulf-Coast Ribbon Snakes.

Snakes fall victim to the crisscrossed death grid we call roads. Roads border every good habitat, every ranch, every preserve, roads are everywhere (but so are we).
With a growing human population and development of land there are several reasons why herps come on or near roads. For one, they have an ever increasing pressure to exit their refuge in the wild as this land is leveled and cleared for other types of development. The pressure results in wildlife emerging from these sites fleeing and seeking new patches of habitat to thrive on. Animals can continue emerging from these sites for months and months and many fall victim to mortality by the ever increasing vehicular activity. Additionally, there is a phenomenon we call the edge effect. In ecology the edge effect is particularly pronounced when the habitat is highly fragmented into ever decreasing patches. Edges and mid-disturbance levels result in higher biodiversity as it creates new microhabitats constantly. Unfortunately, the edge effect we see most as herpers is that one caused by new roads and development. Thus, we encounter a large number of DORs. It is becoming an increasing trend, at least in some areas, that road cruising results in more DORs than live snakes. It’s sad, but not all is lost!
(to be continued)
D.O.R. Texas Coral Snake Micrurus tener tener