Discussion Forums   :::   Classifieds   :::   Suppliers   :::   Rosy of the Month   :::   Boafiles   :::   Archives   :::   Useful Links   :::   Miscellaneous

Updated 1/22/00

"In early May 1991, my roommate and I set out from Reno NV towards a canyon near Death Valley to hunt rosy's.  It was the day before a storm was going to hit the high desert. Which has always proved to be my best nights of hunting. Anyway, we arrived in just after sunset. On the second pass, we found our first rosy of the night. A adult male. Six passes after that, we found an adult female. And seven passes after that, we found one more adult male. Later that night, at the Desert Rose Inn, we put the males in a container with the female. They were still mating with her in the morning. She gave birth to five healthy babies that Fall. That was one of two nights that I've caught three rosy's in one night." - Jerry Hartley

"Four years ago I was hiking in the Harquahala Mountains of Arizona.  It was a trip to see, among other things, Rosy Boas.  One morning I decided to climb to the peak, not for snake hunting, but to enjoy the vistas from the mountain peak.  The mountain peak is at an elevation of 5,681 ft., and there is a helipad at the top.  The wind was blowing at the temperature was in the 70s.  As I reached the top of the peak and looked around, to my amazement, I noticed a male Rosy Boa crawling along the rocks just 20 feet below." - Randy Wright
(editors note:  outside of a few sightings in the San Gabriel Mountains of California, this elevation may be one of the highest documented observations of the Rosy Boa)

"In May of 1996, my best road cruising partner, Ryan Pear and I were on a dirt road near Little Lake in the Mojave Desert of CA.  We knew that no one had ever collected any rosy boas even close to the area, but we thought the habitat was perfect and that we might still be in their range. While listening to a book on cassette (Dean Kootnz, Intensity), and having a couple of good cigars, we found 3 beautiful desert phase rosy's.  Two boys and a girl.  We didn't see any other snakes that night.  We didn't need to." - Jerry Hartley

"On May 18, 1996, I had the privilege of showing a small group of friends a small canyon, well off the highway in the northern Mojave.  We had not expected to find much out this night due to fairly cool air temperatures.  My indoor outdoor thermometer showed a rapidly dropping temperature that registered only 65 degrees at sunset.  We quickly made our way down the dirt road to our destination, assuming we would only have about an hour to hunt before the cold would drive the reptiles beneath the surface.  The only way to hunt this particular canyon is on foot, so with lantern in hand, I set out up the canyon while the others where still piling out of the car.  I had not walked 20 yards before seeing a large male rosy stretched out on a rock shelf at about chest level.  The sight was so striking it looked as if the snake was posing for a picture. Within the following hour we saw four more beautiful rosy boas, and to this day I have yet to surpass that night, as it was by far the best night out rosy boa searching I have ever had." - Jeremiah Easter

"On the morning of June 21, 1993, I was doing some sunrise boa hunting in the Cerbat Mts. north of Kingman, AZ.  I was sitting on a slope and using binoculars to scan a rock pile and its adjacent cliff face about 50-60 yards below me. I had found a female here the week before using this hunting method.  Shortly after 6:00 AM, the sun peeked over the horizon and a family of five Great Horned Owls flew in and lined themselves up on some boulders near the cliff.  I continued my systematic scanning of the area and then came back to the owls.  As I brought the binoculars back onto them, I they suddenly leaned forward and stared intently at a horizontal fissure in the cliff face.  Just emerging along the crack to bask was a subadult  Rosy Boa.  I didn't waste any time in shooing the owls away and running down to collect the snake.  It was a beautiful young male about twenty inches long with almost black stripes on a light cream background.  Closer examination of where the owls were perched revealed many pellets containing snake vertebrae around the bases of the boulders.  This was a regular hunting site for the owls and I had just saved this little guy from being breakfast!"  - Rich Gassaway

Here is a classic published in 1931, by the man himself, Laurence M. Klauber:
"Dogmatic statements are always subject to upsets.  I learned this lesson in 1923 while on a trip with the late Dr. J. Van Denburgh.  He was anxious to procure specimens of L. r. roseofusca, a species not then well represented in the California Academy collection.  After a long trip through promising boa country amongst granite and brush without seeing a specimen, we came down near the coast and drove between cultivated fields.  Here I discoursed at length upon the impossibility of finding a boa in such territory and the necessity of trying the foothills again on another day.  Dr. Van Denburgh's amused smile when the next snake picked up on the road proved to be Lichanura was to be long remembered."

"In 1971 I was attending a small, private college in Riverside, California.  Growing up in Washington state, I was used to searching for the hard-to-find Rubber Boas, and had kept a few of them in aquaria in my bedroom during my high school days.  I was determined, however, to find one of the legendary Rosy Boas of Southern California. The biology professor at my college had described them to me, so a few harmless Rosys would make a welcome addition to the biology lab aquariums he assured me.  Many late evenings were spent in that pursuit, but to no avail. Trips around Riverside were not productive. Trips to Hemet were also disappointing. These California boas were tougher to find than Rubber Boas!  One late-May afternoon, as I sat on a bench at the University of California at Riverside courting one of the coeds, I spied a movement in the shrubs and flowers behind us. Slowly and deliberately a Rosy Boa made its way from the flowerbed down the rocks to the sidewalk. It slid under the bench on which we were seated, and I reached down and gently picked it up—much to the chagrin of the lovely coed who vacated the place in a hurry. I kept the Rosy until I graduated the following year and never saw the coed again. Wasn’t much of a loss after getting a jewel like that California Rosy Boa in hand!" - Shannon Hiatt

"My favorite story is about the first Rosy Boa I ever caught.  On March 28, 1988, I was on a dirt road in Riverside County, just as the sun was going down behind the hillside.  It was still very light out, but I was told to go there early in the evening.  On the very first pass along a straight section, killer rocks on one side and a meadow on the other, there she was - stubby tail and all.  I could see her a good hundred feet the road, smack dab in the middle.  I was so excited, actually I stopped right there, slamming on the brakes, and ran a hundred feet down the road to grab the Rosy.  I was so happy, literally jumping up and down and yelling at the top of my lungs.  I thought she was the most beautiful snake I had ever seen.  The next evening I came back and found a male for her.  What a cool weekend that was! I'll never forget that day as long as I live." - Jerry Hartley