Pennsylvania | The Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History

Delta-spotted Spiketail (Cordulegaster diastatops)

Posted on Jun 22, 2014

Another day, another location with a Delta-spotted Spiketail (Cordulegaster diastatops)..this time in Warren County, Pennsylvania. I had over 25 dragonfly and damselfly species at one spot including another new county record. Meanwhile Twan also added a new county ode in Chautauqua. More to come..

RTPI Bird Fest 2014

Posted on Jun 7, 2014

Thanks to all who joined us for RTPI Bird Fest 2014! All four excursions featured some lovely surprises and great company. This shot of some of our group yesterday morning at Akeley Swamp IBA shows RTPI President Twan Leenders pointing and trip leader Don Watts scoping, perhaps at the recently hatched Hooded Mergansers we observed. Special thanks to Don, Jim Berry, Tim Baird and Terry Mosher for giving us their time and knowledge to lead the trips. We’ll show you our finds and photos this week…

Dragonflies and damselflies weekend

Posted on Jun 2, 2014

Twan and I spent the weekend searching for and netting various dragonflies and damselflies across Chautauqua County in a “divide and conquer” sweep of as many sites as we could hit. The number of natural areas we have to search is overwhelming. While surveying we also recorded birds, butterflies, reptiles, amphibians…you get the picture. It’s a sensory overload! Last year we added several new odonate county records in Chautauqua, Cattaraugus, Warren and more. This included the Delta-spotted Spiketail mere minutes from RTPI. I was able to find another population of the...

Short-headed Garter Snake (Thamnophis brachystoma)

Posted on May 29, 2014

Meet today’s cool neighbor: the Short-headed Garter Snake (Thamnophis brachystoma). This obscure little reptile has one of the smallest distribution ranges of all North American snakes and is only found in a small section of Western New York, adjacent Pennsylvania and reaches just into Ohio. During a quick check of a nearby hibernaculum last week we found a dozen individuals including gravid females and last year’s juveniles, indicating that our local population is doing great.