Crotalus adamanteus
Palisot de Beauvois, 1799
Jasper Co., South Carolina. May 25 1998.
It was late afternoon, and all of us were dozing in the vehicle except Ken, who was behind the wheel. We were still tired from the long drive to South Carolina, and were driving around near the Savannah River, scouting out the country. Ken slammed on the brakes and I nearly concussed myself on the dashboard, because this beauty was crossing the two-lane road! We managed to safely guide the rattler onto the shoulder while halting traffic behind us, and I’m sure the folks in those vehicles thought we were nuts! We didn’t care – this was our first adamanteus, and we spent quite a while taking photos and simply admiring it. The diamondback was about a meter long, and it didn’t rattle much and wouldn’t coil, trying to crawl away instead.
What an afternoon to remember.
My Flickr album for this species is here.
HerpMapper records for this species are here.
