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JW: Six hundred feet below the rim where we were, getting closer now to the river itself.
RM: Nice diversity of plants, again. This is an interesting place, and look! Heh-heh!
(JW: A snake
in the . . .) Right in the path, right in the sunlight, warming up a little bit. One
of the King Snakes.
JW: Not to be afraid of.
RM: No, none of the nonpoisonous varieties. Let me just get a little closer - hold my
net, let me
see if I can't just pick him up. Common name for that one is the Black King Snake, you
can see
how dark he is on his back. I don't think he's going to do too much moving . . . look
at this, Jim.
(JW: Wow! Very . . .) Look at this! Nonchalant snake, one of the snakes that, that generally
acts
this way. Very, very powerful constrictor.
JW: Why is he called the King Snake?
RM: Probably a couple of reasons, one is because pound for pound he is as powerful as any
snake in the world as far as being a constrictor. And he also feeds on poisonous snakes, Jim,
he
could take a Copperhead that might be here, or a Rattlesnake that might be here, and even
if the
poisonous snake bites him, he's immune to the venom of those poisonous snake. So that
kind-of
makes him King. The Black King Snake, uh, name comes from the fact that there really
aren't any
distinct markings on the back. It's basically all, uh, black. And then when you look on
the sides a
little bit, you can see yellow splotches - see that? (JW: Mmmhmm.) And then the belly is,
again,
black and yellow patterned. But as I hold this snake, I mean it's no question, this
is one that has
very powerful muscles. And it would grab a snake with six rows of teeth that it's got,
and gets a
good grip and then wrap around it with two or three coils, put on the squeeze, just cuts
off the
breathing of the snake. . . (JW: They might get twice this big.) . . . and swallows it.
RM: Oh yes, yes, uh-huh, they can get two or three, uh, times this large. But this is
really an
average size for, uh, this, uh, variety of - really, it's a race of the Eastern King
Snake. The Black
King Snake.
JW: Should we put him back right where he was?
RM: Yeah, this is an interesting animal, isn't that a beauty? Feeds on mice and other things,
too.
But, but really is well known for his habit of feeding on other snakes, especially poisonous
ones.
And I don't know, he's not moving very rapidly. Let's just put him down here and see if he'll,
yeah,
ease on away. I've always enjoyed the way those things move. As he moves away, now,
there are
lots of plants right here. One that really jumps out at me is that little shrubby thing
- look at the way
the bark's peeling off, and look at the leaf!
JW: What kind of plant?
RM: That is one of the Hydrangeas, there is last years' fruit on it, and look at those
leaves. Oak-
shaped leaves, so the common name for that is Oak-leafed Hydrangea. And doing very well
on
sloping hillsides by the Little River here.
JW: There're some pretty Spring flowers below the Hydrangea, they almost look cultivated.
RM: Yeah, heh, you know, that - look at the leaf - looks like a geranium. Really, well
that is a
geranium. This is the, the native, or Wild, we call it, Geranium. Beautiful, beautiful
flowers, open
now, most of them are, a few of them haven't opened up yet. But the leaf is a good giveaway
on
identification. This has been a marvelous, uh, day for Spring wildflowers. There's one
of my
favorite, really, low-growing wildflowers. The leaf, I guess, well, and the flower give
it away. That's
an Iris, isn't it? Iris is the genus name for that. . . (JW: Cultivated in many places.)
. . . and the
scientific name for that. And Dwarf Iris is the general common name, and isn't that beautiful!
Petals and sepals are bluish purple on that plant. And of course the leaves look just
like Iris
leaves. And then there's a shrub over there, and the wind is blowing a little. I almost
get a whiff or
a smell of the flowers on that shrub.
JW: A very sweet aroma.
RM: Really sweet, and it's a shrubby plant, so Sweet Shrub makes pretty good sense. Look
at
those flowers, they smell almost like cantaloupe to me, Jim, I don't know what it smells like
to you.
But, springtime. . . (JW: Almost maroon-like in color.) uh, on there. Yeah, and you can
break the
branch now, on that plant in the Winter, you know, and it still has that nice, uh, sweet
smell.
JW: Rudy here's another slender flower, very blue.
RM: Mmmhmm, and look at the shape of the flowers on that, now. That makes the common
name very sensible. Blue Stars is the common name for that. Named after a, uh, German doctor,
Doctor Amson, so Amsonia is the genus name. One of the poisonous plants in the Dogbane
family, but of course beautiful, to the, uh, to the eye.
JW: And there are several. Here's your net.
RM: Oh yeah, yeah, let's head on down toward the river.