First Spring in "Spring Garden"

The weather warmed up to over 50F and so I decided to visit the Spring Garden natural area. The Eastern Garter Snakes were out and about, and moving than they were when the temperature was in the mid 40s. It was a pleasant short hike.

I started going off trail a bit, though I didn't find any snakes until I returned to the trail. I found my first "snake under cover" for the year when I returned to some roofing shingles I had discovered on a previous visit.

I didn't find anything interesting spider wise--just a handful of immature wolf spiders. I found a couple of Mourning Cloak butterflies and my first honey bee of the season. Flipping logs and other items yielded slugs in genus Arion and genus Ambigolimax, as well as a few snails, probably from the genus Oxychilus. I also found a fairly large nematode.

Posted on March 23, 2016 09:29 AM by marknenadov