230 THE AMERICAN MIDLAND NATURALIST 



Natrix kirtlandii (Kennicott) 

 Kirtland's Water Snake 



(Page 74; maps 17 and 54; plate 9, fig. 2) 



Far from being the rarity it once seemed, evidence is still accumulating to 

 prove that Natrix kirtlandii is widely distiibuted in western Ohio. No new 

 centers of concentrated abundance (like those at Toledo and Cincinnati) have 

 been discovered, but records are now at hand from eleven additional counties, 

 eight of which lie wholly, and one almost entirely, within the till plains of 

 western Ohio. Wood and Duellman (1947a) have published upon localities 

 from the Miami Valley. New records are: 



Allen County: 2 mi. N of Bluffton (OSM 708.1-2. 822). Butler County: 

 Oxford (GF). Champaign Counts': Near Kennard (OSM 745). Clark County: 

 Crystal Lake (DPLM). Clermont County : Goshen (CSNH 2657). Darke 

 County: Near Greenville (WED 409). Erie County: Sandusky (AMNH 3370). 

 Greene County: Xenia (Wood & Duellman, 1947a). Hamilton County: (SL 

 442); Cincinnati (CM 24115-7; CSNH 194, 1591. 2032; SL 781-2); Clifton, Cin- 

 cinnati (CSNH 1632.1-2, 2164.1-25, 2346.1-2); Coy Field, Cincinnati (UC 5A-D); 

 Mt. Airy, Cincinnati (CM 20630); Mt. Washington, Cincinnati (AMNH 65514-9); 

 Westwood, Cincinnati (CM 20603-10). Jackson County : White's Gulch, Liberty 

 Twp. (HTG; OUVC 345). Logan County: East Side, Indian Lake (WED 63, 

 66); Liberty Twp. (OSM 486, 529). Lucas Counts- Toledo (CA 5283; CM 

 20611-29; CMNH 82; CU 3504a-b; UMMZ 96992). Marion County: Sec 5. 

 Marion Twp. (OSM 534). Montgomery Counts': Dayton (DPLM; WED 64-5). 

 Paulding Counts': 3 mi. NE of Antwerp (OSM 501). Wood County: Maumee 

 River, opposite Waterville (CA 5284-5). Gier advises me that one of Dr. Eggleston's 

 students collected a specimen of l(irtlandii in Squaw Hollow, just west of Marietta, 

 Washington County. This snake was subsequently lost. 



In all probability kirtlandii will turn up in numerous other localities in 

 western Ohio, but its secretive nature and marked preference for prairie or 

 prairie-like habitats make it difficult to find. The marl bog near Kennard, 

 Champaign County, for example, has been visited by naturalists for many 

 years, but kirtlandii was not discovered there until July 2, 1947. Th? species 

 also is likely to be found in eastern Ohio, for it has long been known from 

 western Pennsylvania which it may have reached through the eastward exten- 

 sion of the prairie peninsula (see Transeau, 1935, and Schmidt, 1938). 



Among recently collected material, most interest probably should focus 

 upon the snak's from southeastern Ohio. Natrix kirtlandii has previously 

 been reported from unglaciated Ohio (Fairfield and Hocking counties — page 

 75), but specimens are now also available from another place within the borders 

 of the same phvsiographic province — along the stream below White's Gulch 

 in Jackson County. Attention should be called to the fact, however, that the 

 localities in all three of these counties are on the floors of filled vallevs, silts 

 to considerable depths having been deposited when the valleys were dammed 

 by glaciers to the north and west. Thomas has pointed out to me that condi- 

 tions in these localities are not typical of the unglaciated plateau and that the 

 areas in question resemble those of certain parts of glaciated Ohio. The filled 

 valleys, for example, contain many boggy and marshy spots, habitats that are 

 notably lacking elsewhere in the southeastern part of the state. 



