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But relocating eastern diamondback rattlesnakes can be done, researcher Jayme Waldron found. And moving them to larger tracts of pinelands might be the best bet for conserving what is maybe the most hated native Lowcountry species.
The diamondback is a keystone species in the health of the longleaf savanna ecosystem, the pines that are the heart of the Lowcountry. That's places like the prestigious ACE Basin, the ecological preserve of nearly a quarter-million acres along the Ashepoo, Combahee and Edisto rivers between Charleston and Beaufort.
The tracts are habitat for 300 varieties of native plants, myriad birds including the wild turkey, 170 species of reptiles or amphibians, and 36 mammals. The rattler eats rodents and is food for raptors and other animals.
The diamondback is a species of concern in South Carolina, disappearing as people move in. Foresters are now working in places such as the ACE Basin to restore the savannas after two centuries of devastating logging and the substitution of poorer quality commercial pine habitat.
Waldron's study confirmed what a lot of herpetologists suspected intuitively. A relocated diamondback won't stay put, at least for the first year. It will cover four times as much range as usual before it settles down. So, the farther it can be kept from traveled roads the better. Waldron's findings suggest it's safer for the snakes if they are relocated to woodlands bigger than the ones they left.
Waldron conducted the study for the University of Georgia in cooperation with S.C. Department of Natural Resources Department. She relocated 10 snakes from tracts in the ACE Basin along with two for other sites to the Webb Wildlife Center along the Savannah River, after radio tracking them for a year on their home range.
Waldron found that for the first year, the relocated snakes did cover more ground, and apparently to look for a place similar to the one they were taken from. For instance, one female was relocated from ricefield impoundments. The snake didn't settle until it found a cypress swamp.
"It seems they were trying to figure out where they were, keying on some landscape feature we don't understand," she said. "Cypress swamps don't look anything like ricefield impoundments. But they're wet."
