9-5-15

Trip Details

Location: Near San Jose Del Cabo, Baja California Sur, Mexico

Herpers: Shawn Vought, Jason Nelson, Joe Ehrenberger, Matt Cage, Mike Pingleton, Jim Scharosch

Account by: Jim Scharosch

Photos by: Jim Scharosch

This is a record of my first international trip that was solely focused on herping. I have herped outside of the US on other occasions, even this year I spent a day herping in Puerto Rico. But that was a family vacation where most of my time was spent on the beach hanging out. A few years ago Mike Pingleton and I talked about the possibility of going on some exotic adventure to the Amazon or Costa Rica. I wanted to do it, but for whatever reason never pulled the trigger. Mike took the ball and ran with it

He has made numerous trips to all sorts of places that I would love to herp. I have to admit that I was somewhat jealous of his ability to jump in with both feet and experience all of these things. Last year I tried at the last minute to get in on their Mexico trip, but it didn’t work out. This year Mike asked me if I wanted in and I didn’t have to think about it for very long. I’m so glad I did, and I think the experience changed me a bit. I enjoyed the herping, the comaraderie of my fellow herpers and the experience of being outside of my comfort zone so much that I think I am addicted to it. I can’t wait to get back and am already plotting a trip back.

I spent the few weeks before I left reading and preparing for the trip. I hadn’t really seriously herped in a desert habitat before. I’m also not a big fan of road cruising, which is what this trip would be all about. I was still excited though, because I knew I was going with a group that was experienced and it wouldn’t take long to into the swing of things.

I flew into San Juan Del Cabo and met up with Matt Cage and Joe E at the airport. Mike Pingleton came in about an hour later. Shaun and Jason were arriving later and would meet us at the hotel. We spent the afternoon getting our rental cars sorted out and then went to the hotel and shopped for essentials for the trip. We eventually met up with Shaun and Jason then we grabbed dinner at our first taqueria of the trip. The food was great, which would be a running theme for the entire trip.

Soon as it started to get dark we hit the road to get cruising. It was cloudy and rainy and the temperature was a bit cool for cruising.

Mike and I were in a car, Matt and Joe in another and Shaun and Jason in the third. It rained a bit as we were going out and not a lot of snakes were moving. There were a lot of toads on the road though. This is a Red Spotted Toad (Anaxyrus punctatus), of which we would see about fifty-million over then next ten days.

My notes from the evening weren’t very good, so I’m not sure who found what, but we ended up with a juvenile Red Diamond Rattlesnake (Crotalus ruber).

We would see many more of these awesome snakes during the trip. This one was a newborn from this year and was about ten inches long.

We also got this Cape Gopher Snake (Pituophis c. vertabralis)

It was also a juvenile and about fourteen inches long.

We also got this juvenile Speckled Rattlesnake (Crotalus mitchelii).

This was one of the main things I was looking forward to seeing on this trip. It was a just a newborn baby, but it was still awesome to see.

I had a good time even though we didn’t see a lot. I was excited to get out again.