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Show 2 . GREENING “MES - APRIL 1994 — Shakers & Quakers More EASEMENT from Page 1 While hiking with friends during Researchers have documented repeated use of a den for 25 years, but it is believed that some dens are occupied — Easter week I saw many signs of for hundreds even thousands of years. who had made the $10 payments needed every three years to keep the easement current, information missing from the State Lands file and not Spring—quick gusts of wind, a light smattering of rain, leaves unfolding, Most rattlesnake bites in the West occur in the spring when the snakes are early bursts of color in the biscuit root. said to be the most aggressive—as they available from the local office. (It was the lack of a payment in 1992 that caused the easement to be cancelled. The bill was sent to an old PO Box for the CVRR which Hersel Nokes had maintained but which had been abandoned in 1990. By '92 the forwarding address had expired.) We had already looked through the FDA files on Hersel’s assurance that the FDA had made the payments. None were found. Who had made the payments was a missing link in the easement history. The State had no records of who had made the payments. In talking to the State official, however, Barbara noticed that an overpayment had been made. When Barbara asked him about this, the official acknowledged that this overpayment would make us current in payments (due every three years). He would, therefore, recommend to the Board that the easement be reinstated. A simple phone call changed the course of events. Yet it was through a complicated process of research, inquiry, data analysis, and perseverance that Barbara was able to spot the overpayment. When help was needed Barbara came through, followed through, and was thorough—and the results saved this community thousands of dollars to buy back the easement In a fledgling community where volunteer labor is virtually all that is available, such an effort deserves a whole-hearted round of applause and deep gratitude. ——Joan Sangree Indian paintbrush, and woolly locoemerge from their dens in search of weed. But the most exciting sign of food. Few rattlers travel more than a spring was a snake. mile from these dens during the rest of Dylan, my 14-year-old nephew sat the year. resting on the cliffside and turned to I imagine that somewhere near our find a small rattlesnake a few feet property is a den, for Charlie and I have away. Seeing that the snake was calm seen several rattlers. The second spring and unalarmed, he slowly moved away . we were here, before we had bought and called to us. Several of us scam4) our land, we came across our first pered up the hillside to the rock rattler. He was crossing the road overhang and watched the rattler as he did nothing. He was under two feet long, rather faded looking with light blotches on his sand-colored back. His rattle alone gave him away as the potentially dangerous pit viper that he was, the Crotalus viridis concolor, aka. the Midget Faded Rattlesnake. subspecies of the Western Rattlesnake. He is the only rattlesnake ever documented in southeastem Utah. The Midget Faded is rarely Over 24 inches long. cream or yellowish in color, with rounded ' blotches of a darker color along the ‘ entire body. These blotches are often quite light or absent. The reclusive rattler is seldom sighted and has demonstrated very little aggression. In fact there has never been a report of a rattlesnake bite in this area—a good thing, as their venom is of high toxicity and there is no antivenin. In the spring rattlers descend from the rocky cliffs where they have spent the winter months in their dens, usually dark holes or crevices deep enough in the rock to provide warmth and protection from freezing weather. Ninety percent of these dens favor the sun on southern slopes and almost all are protected from northern winds. JANIE TUFI‘ ' SALES AGENT pm PM! 5.25m 47 E. CENTER STREET MOAB. UT 84532 801-259-2650 P.O.Box 1121 - Moab UT 84532 Res. 801—259—8360 . Leave Message near what was to become our drive— way. A few moments later we came upon two more rattlers, reared up and facing each other. We assumed it was a love dance, but experts call this display"aggressive male behav- .“ ior," a combat dance expressing eitha territorial defense or domina tion. Only once have I heard the sound of a rattle here in the valley. When our dog was still a puppy she came upon a rattler and was very curious. Though the snake had plenty of opportunity to strike, it didn’t. We shouted several times, the puppy came to us, and the snake quickly retreated. Our children and their friends have often found bullsnakes and brought them home. We have always placed them in the garden or around the house, believing that they eat rattlers along with their preferred diet of rodents. There is some disagreement here: bullsnakes are often found in the same den as rattlers, but eyewitnesses swear they kill rattlers. At any rate, bullsnakes are always welcome to enjoy the mice in my neighborhood. Eagles—along with red-tailed hawks, coyotes, wildcats, raccoons, and skunks—are natural predators of the rattler. Deer and antelop as well as pigs are also known to kill the reptiles by stomping. In fact many herpetologists suspect that the rattle evolved as protection from herds of buffalo on western prairies (rattlers are found only in America). Warning larger animals to steer clear seems to work, except when it comes to man. Another theory is that the rattle was developed as a means to draw attention away from the head to More SHAKERS on Page 9 |