New Hampshire Nature Notes
by Eric Orff

Piping plovers, alligators, lizards frogs and snakes, oh my!

Friday 04/01/2005

Had a really cool day today.

It did start off real cool as I headed over to Hampton Beach State park to meet other Fish and Game folks and a few volunteers for our annual "NH plover day". This was the tenth year I have assisted in putting up a guide fence to keep people from disturbing the areas that the federally threatened piping plovers will likely nest in. Over the years the areas needed to be protected has grown as the birds have expanded their nesting territory.

We had a big crew of 14 for a while yesterday so it made the job of stringing the nearly mile and a half of fence a pleasant task. And the cool cloudy morning was atypical for this job as the last few years it has either poured or snowed on this day with gale force winds.

We actually had the fence strung up, signs in place and were loaded up by mid afternoon. We made the annual pilgrimage to Browns Seafood for a nice lunch break.

One of the volunteers is a staff member of the New England Reptile Distributors of Plaistow and invited us over for a "behind the scene" tour of the facility. There were hundred of snakes and other reptiles to see in the captive breeding area. I was so amazed. Hundreds of drawers in climate controlled rooms filled with snakes. Mostly non poisonous boas of every color and variety imaginable. Including a rare pure white one that was not an albino. Cool, cool critters for a biologist like me.

I got to handle a variety of reptiles including a cobra! Monitor lizards that were nine feet long and a pithon that was 18 and a half feet long. A very memorable day!