Texas Snakes: A Field Guide arrived in the mail yesterday. I’m not going to add this one to the “In Progress” reading list. Nor do I think I’m going to read the entire book. I did thumb through it last night, looking at the pretty pictures and reading about “snakes I have known” — those snakes we share the ranch with, for instance. The gray-banded king snake is gorgeous, but I’m unlikely to encounter him at the ranch; his habitat is only in spotty areas of the West Texas Highlands. The copperhead I chased a few years ago was likely an adult — specifically a Broad-banded Copperhead. The cottonmouth I thought I saw in the pond? Probably not — it didn’t swim with it’s head out of the water, so it was probably a Diamond-backed Water Snake, whose habitat includes the ranch area — and most of Texas.

It’s a fascinating book, and I’m looking forward to getting a lot of use out of it.