Gardens as refuge for reptiles and amphibians

[macmex]

I have a love hate relationship with rototillers (more hate than love). One of the reasons is that my garden, which though it normally looks weedy, does produce. While it's producing it also provides cover and food for quite a bit of wildlife. I'm convinced that the wildlife helps control pests by providing balance to the ecology of the garden. When able I prefer to use hand tools because they provide a greater degree of selectivity as to what gets whacked.

Saturday was the first full day in weeks that my wife and I were able to work in the yard and garden. We spent the whole day at it, thankful for the beautiful weather. Among other things I carved out a corner of the main garden for Baker Family Heirloom tomato. I try to plant my tomatoes far apart and in blocks, for the sake of saving pure seed. So I did 10 Baker Family Heirloom plants at the farthest corner, opposite Heidi. There the weeds were waist high as I hadn't plowed with the tractor. I waded in with a hand sickle, cutting weeds and alternately saving them for our livestock and using them as mulch in other parts of the garden. I actually enjoy this very much. The weeds themselves become a kind of crop, being put to good use on the homestead.

I hadn't gone far before I came across this pair, of box turtles.


Sorry to interrupt an intimate moment! One ran off as fast as a box turtle can run. The other only scooted off, into the edge of the heavy weeds. I ended up moving him across the garden, into another weedy patch, as I didn't want to risk hitting him with the mattock when I got to working soil.

Not ten minutes later, while starting to use the mattock and make spots to plant Baker Family Heirloom, I encountered Junior, who was also making top speed (for a turtle) trying to escape the monster who was tearing up his home.




I moved him to the black berries by my greenhouse, as that's a thick tangle with moisture nearby.

Shortly afterwards, as I walked by the blackberries, I spotted a plastic bag which had gotten lost in their tangle. I pulled it out, in order to put it in the trash. Wouldn't you know? There was a speckled king snake under that bag!
I only caught the snake for the sake of the photo, letting it go, so it could hide under the greenhouse.



I suspect we have a number of these king snakes in the garden. Later in the day I found either another speckled king snake or the same one, about 20' from where I left the first one. The day before I spotted a much larger snake, sneaking off under the greenhouse. It had a bluish color to it, which meant it was either a speckled king snake or a blue racer. Besides these, I spotted fence skinks and leopard frogs.

All these critters provide a lot of pleasure for me but I strongly suspect they also help the overall health of the garden.

[heavyhitterokra]

What cool finds, George! I haven't seen a King snake in years. I always enjoy seeing those. I've happened on to three red-eared turtles laying eggs in various places in my yard this week. It must be Spring time!

[chrysanthemum]

Junior was cute!

We get a lot of frogs, toads, and skinks in our garden area. I’m sure it’s the moisture from my watering that attracts them. One year my kids even named the asparagus patch “Froggy Forest.” I enjoy seeing them.

I’ve seen the occasional snake but not too often. Thankfully they’ve only been garter snakes and not rattlers or coral snakes. I’ve seen coral snakes several times in the non-garden areas, though. I have a feeling that the presence of snakes decreases the population of the frogs and skinks. (I also think that the raccoon that was digging may have been going after toads or skinks as well because the digging often occurred where I had noticed a little hole in the soil previously.)

[chrysanthemum]

I don’t have any pictures, but I spotted a garter snake in the garden the other day. I also got a shock when I stood up from watering some okra seedlings and was face to face with a gray from perched on the edge of my shade cloth that hangs overtop the garden. He was gone when I came back with a camera. I was sorry to have disturbed him.

[heavyhitterokra]

The cover crop that I planted back in mid-August failed, due to non-viable seeds.  So after a month had passed, along with several good rains, and no seeds ever germinated, I finally decided I'd plow and replant with fresh seeds.  I plowed until it got too dark to see last night, then left the tractor in the garden and walked back home.  Early this morning, I went back out there in the wonderful 46 degree weather to retrieve my tractor, then walked back down to the garden to sow 5 more pounds of clover seeds.  After only a few days without rain the soil is already as fine as face powder and twice as dusty.  (A perfect environment for recording fresh tracks).


While sowing seeds, I noticed the dusty ground was covered with a variety of interesting little tracks.  It's amazing to think what goes on at night that we never even perceive.  Little mice, lizards, toads, centipedes, grass snakes, grass spiders, rabbits, deer, and no telling what had been scouring the dusty soil beneath our apple and persimmon trees.  By the time I got the seeds all sown and the dogs had finished walking everywhere behind me, most of the tracks were obliterated, but I still went back home to find the camera to see if I could catch a few glimpses of what was left to post here this afternoon.


You'll have to zoom in on these to see the detail.  Any ideas what may have made these?  The little gray specs are clay-coated, 'pelletized' clover seeds.

Same thing here.  Your guess is as good as mine, but they are very interesting to follow.

God's Expressway.  Do you think they have traffic jams down there too?

Rabbit tracks were everywhere.  

This particular critter left a little round imprint every few inches, that broke the continuous line left by whatever it was up to.  When I enlarged this one, it looked like the soil had been burrowed under.  Maybe, the round circles were where something was popping up for air every few inches.  These were tiny track ways, maybe 1/2" inch wide. You can see a few pelletized clover seeds to the right of the trail as a size reference.

My garden is about 150' to 200' feet long, by about 150' feet wide, in a large trapezoid shape that roughly follows the dried up banks of an old creek bed.  This wide of a dusty, flat, surface must have seemed as big as the state of Texas to whatever creatures were trekking through it last night.