
I found this laying across Forest Service Road #852 a few days ago (9-3-2024) after a brief jaunt along the northern border of the north unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. The smoke from Canada was becoming bad on this day and the light was less than spectacular, so I didn't roam much farther than here after I completed some errands in Watford City. In fact, I have not been able to shoot anything since my July images in Casper, for I was too busy with work and finding a new apartment after a fire in another unit of the building in which I lived (zero damage to my unit, thankfully!).
This bullsnake was stretched across half of the scoria-gravel road and probably in the neighborhood of five feet in length. They are rather common here and sometimes confused with the prairie rattlers that also reside in this region (generally southwest of the Missouri River, especially in and around the badlands). They will often "rattle" their tails by keeping them on the ground in the surrounding vegetation and flatten their heads while adopting a rattlesnake-like posture to scare away perceived threats. This one was probably not happy I was near at hand taking images and disappeared quite rapidly when I made the short walk to the car to change lenses. They can and will bite but only as a last defense. I'll pass on that risk of infection, though, and stick with shooting these from a safe distance!
This is more of a snapshot than anything overly photogenic, thus I've only posted this to a handful of the North Dakota groups. Something to share until I regain some creativity and inspiration. :)