BULLETIN FLORIDA MUSEUM NATURAL HISTORY VOL. 38, PT. 1(5)


Table 5. Distances traveled by eastern diamondback rattlesnakes at the Ordway Preserve, Putnam County,
Florida.


Total Duration Interval Distance Distance
Distance Tracked No. Between Obs. Per Obs. Per Day
(m) Snake (days) Obs. (days) (m) (m)


3,409 Ml 273 82 3.3 41.6 12.5
5,697 M2 234 71 3.3 80.2 24.3
22,420 M3 864 245 3.5 91.5 25.9
3,816 M4 281 105 2.7 36.3 13.6
5,664 FI 375 126 2.9 45.0 15.1
5,184 F2 312 74 4.2 70.1 16.6
554 F3 33 11 3.0 50.4 16.8
649 MS 89 29 3.1 22.4 7.3






Table 6. Activities of eight eastern diamondback rattlesnakes at the Ordway Preserve, Putnam County,
Florida. Numbers in parentheses represent percentages of observations for that particular time interval.


 No. Snake
 Not
 Hours Obs. Coiled Loose Crawling Visible


 0600-1200 449 217(75.1) 47(16.3) 25 (8.6) 160
 1201-1800 240 129(75.9) 27(15.9) 14(8.2) 70
 1801-2400 44 21(84.0) 3 (12.0) 1(4.0) 19
 2401-0559 10 6(100.0) 0(0.0) 0(0.0) 4


 Totals 743 373 (76.1) 77(15.7) 40(8.2) 253





 the sandy roads were frequently seen, and always demonstrating their prowlings to
 be at night," and Ernst (1992) reported that "many are run over by autos at night."
 I can find no evidence in my study, or elsewhere, to support these claims; no
 rattlesnakes in the present study were observed traveling after sundown. However,
 one diamondback rattlesnake was seen crawling at the Ordway in September 1983
 at about 2200 hrs at the Smith Lake house (Franz pers. comm.).
 Because of their diurnal movement pattern, and because diamondbacks eat
 diurnal mammals such as rabbits and squirrels, Means (1985) classifies the