I'll approach this fairly chronologically, though I won't be specifying exact dates. As always, more information can usually be found about a particular photo by clicking on the photo and following the link to it's page on my Flickr. Exact locale information is not disclosed, though in a few cases I've disclosed the county/parish, as it was interesting or at least noteworthy to myself.
Link to Entire 2015 Flickr Album
Late Winter - 2015
In January, Armin and I got together one weekend to just see what was up that early in the year. We knew of milk snakes being found on particularly warm days in January/February, so we wanted to give it a shot.
Driving through, it was a pretty cool and frosty morning, but it would warm up to the upper 60's later in the day.

No milk snakes showed up for us, but we did hike up a ribbon snake in the afternoon.


As time allowed, I took a few weekend jaunts to south Texas and the coastal barrier islands in both January, February, and early March. In the right weather, most species can be found active at this time. Here's a few things from that late winter period.







Backyard Frog:











In late February, I met up with Armin and his buddy Pat for a quick trip to South Texas. It was Armin's birthday, and we planned to celebrate with some south Texas specialties. We did pretty well and got to see several new species for all of us.








On our last day, we had a cold front blow in overnight, and temperatures plummeted into the 40°F's. We woke early, as usual, but Pat was a bit difficult to get motivated. He said we weren't going to find any snakes and it was "Lord of the Rings Marathon weather." Still, after some prodding, we got out and donned our heaviest clothing and did some flipping. Our hands were freezing cold, and the 10-15mph winds weren't helping. Under the first piece of tin, we got a nice chilly atrox, and I think it lifted Pat's spirits a bit.

Shortly after, a small patchnose:

And then, a few minutes later while navigating what looked like Africanized Bee central, I flipped this cool snake under a 1ftx1ft piece of plywood.


Finding that leptodeira was certainly the highlight of the trip, and a good omen for things to come this year.
We continued to herp up the way back towards Houston.

I continued to spend weekends down there when I could, and a few more things turned up. Barrier island milks are always neat to see, and several showed up this year.









I spent a bit of time with Blake, near the southern tip of Texas. We had a good bit of fun and found some cool things.


















One day, we flipped another one of these at the spot I discovered:

And then cruised one of these not far away:

Spring - 2015
Being a calligaster nut, I jumped at the chance to go see mole kings with Tamara and Ray in Alabama. We talked a bit, and then I spoke to Armin about it. What started as a quick weekend jaunt to Alabama turned into a multi-day excursion to Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi, and it ended up being one of the most memorable trips I've had, an possibly will have. We did some careful planning, and google mapping, and found some flip sites to target. Our first day was going to be with Diamondback Dave, where he'd show us around his neck of the woods and hopefully we'd get to see some diamondbacks.
I ended up leaving my house in Houston around 1-2am, to get to Armin's in Baton Rouge by 5-6am. We then zipped over to Florida, and I got a quick nap. Close to noon, we were at Dave's and herping. While no diamondbacks showed up at Dave's, and we got rained on most of the day, we still had a really good time and got to see some lifers.





The following day, we headed back west to meet with Tamara. Our goal was to herp the way back, and then be at Tamara's house around 10pm. We were really wanting to flip a mole king, but I can't complain with how the day went instead.
One of the first finds of the day was this copperhead. We actually saw a couple, which is surprising considering they're supposed to be difficult to find in Florida.

We cruised a grey rat during the day:

The main attraction of the day, however, was one we expected to see the least. I copy/pasted this story directly from the Flickr Photos.
And here's the star of that day:Armin and I had planned for this trip thoroughly, and had located many abandoned houses and barns that supported large amounts of artificial cover in good habitat for our targets.
Until you get there, however, you never really know if it's truly abandoned. Such was the situation when we pulled up to this driveway situated adjacent to the drive for an obviously occupied residence. Upon examining the gate, I noticed a layer of leaves covering the bottom of it. It clearly hadn't been opened in a while.
I signaled Armin that we were in the clear, and he turned off the truck and we quietly crept in, making sure not to make too much noise and alert the neighbors. We walked onto the property and saw it was lacking in the cover we had hoped it would have. Still, we had come this far, why not poke around some more?
In the back of the property we came upon a large barn roof/side, laying flat on the ground, that was about 25x25ft. It was fashioned from tin, on top of plywood, supported by 2x4s on the bottom. It was very heavy, and were only able to peak under corners.
As we worked our way around this mightiest of flips, trying to get a peak under the edges, I saw the dirty coil of a large, rough scaled snake slink further under the cover. I shouted to Armin "Big snake! I think it's our diamondback!"
With renewed effort, we heaved to lift this monstrous bit of flip and see what was underneath. Barely getting an edge 3ft off the ground, Armin was able to lean down and rest it on his shoulder and look at the snake, which was now situated about 6-8ft to my right. I couldn't see at all, from where I was lifting.
Through the dust and harsh light, Armin couldn't make out exactly what it was, but he told me "it's either a cotton or a pine, go get it!"
Getting down on my belly I crawled towards it, only part of a dark coil visible to me, no pattern was apparent, and in the light it was truly hard to tell what it was. Hoping it truly was a pine, I gave it a quick poke to see what would happen. With that slight touch, this 4ft pine snake whipped around and we heard a sharp "Hssssssssss!"
The classic "snake noise" in movies was played out before us as this pine snake hiss and tried to scare us away. With that, we quickly grabbed it and danced away victoriously.



Our trip was made, even if we hadn't seen our target! We finished off the day with a scarlet king that was in-shed (no photos).
We made it in Tamara's, and were treated to some heaping bowls of ice cream, and got to talk herps with some of the most enthusiastic herp people I've ever met. Both Tamara and Ray were great hosts, and it was a real treat to get to go out with them. I can't thank them enough for their hospitality and their part in our exciting adventure.
The following morning we woke and Tamara and Ray took us to their mole king spot. We looked around and saw quite a few snakes, but no calligaster showed up. Still, we were having a great time!
Along with this corn snake, we saw another rat, a racer or two, and a pinewoods snake.

After that, we hit another area, hoping for a mole, EDB, or lodingi. We poked around, but nothing showed up. I started looking on google maps for more junk nearby that may have been missed by us. I spotted some stuff, and we drove over to it. We turned up a dirty looking king (one of a couple for the day). Way off down the road in the woods, however, was another few things. Spurred by Tamara's excitement, we made the trek out to it, and got yet another big surprise for the trip.
Again, I've copied the story from the Flickr photo, and pasted here.
As seen:
In early spring, Armin and I met Tamara and her husband Ray to look for Black Pines and Eastern Diamondbacks in southern Alabama.
While both are present in the area, they are by no means a guaranteed find. With that in mind, Tamara took us to an area she had seen them before.
We flipped some trash along a sandy road. A place locals deemed fit to dump couches and old mattresses. An eyesore for sure, but delightful for us. We poured through it, with no snakes to be found. Not even a rat snake!
I pulled out my phone and looked at the satellite images around us, making sure we had thoroughly covered the area. I noticed that just down the road, along a thin dirt road, was a small patch of stuff. Tamara hadn't been there before, and we were excited for new cover to flip.
We arrived, and saw that it was a private drive with "No Trespassing" signs. It looked like the locals paid no attention to this, as there was a well worn path around the gate. No fence hopping required. As they say, when in Rome...
Approaching the small pile of trash we spied a mattress and some old cans and bottles. Not a lot of good flipping material. Turning the mattress yielded an in-shed kingsnake.
Once more, I pulled out my phone, and spied a couple more potential spots that appeared to be fallen hunting stands, about a 1/4 mile down the private drive, along a powerline right-of-way. Tamara, as enthusiastic as ever, led the charge. We arrived to the first of the two spots, and there was only a single 1x4ft board there, and flipping it yielded nothing.
Nearby, however, through the woods was the other spot. We waded through the thick tangle and stumbled into a sunny clearing. We could see some good cover. Two large 4x4 sheets of plywood, propped up by 2x4s laid on the ground, and a layer of three 2x4 sheets of plywood leaned up against it. Excellent looking cover for a large snake like a pine or a diamondback!
With our eyes on the prize, we approached and turned everything over, and much to our chagrin this great looking cover yielded nothing!
Turning to leave back to the car where Ray was waiting for us, Tamara stopped suddenly. "There! There's a snake!"
It took a minute for my eyes to adjust, but as they focused, the form of a large 5ft black snake became apparent to me in the grass we had just walked through. There it was, a big black pine snake, plain as day, and we had walked right by it! The snake had apparently been using the cover over night, and had come out as the sun began to peek over the treeline. Luckily, it didn't leave after we walked by it!


That afternoon, Tamara and Ray took us to their hunting property where she has a few bits of cover. This was really excellent looking habitat. Some of the best managed long leaf pine forest I had been in. If we were gonna hike up an EDB, it was here!
We found nothing under cover, but had the rest of the day to explore and see what we could find. We turned up a hognose and a gorgeous scarlet king in short order.



At one point, I came across an burned down barn/shelter of some sort, and it had tons of tin around it. Looking through it, yielded nothing. I began to strategically spread some of it out, thus bringing upon the last big find of our trip.
Last little story, taken from my write-up earlier on the Flickr page:
The baby corn:While hiking on well managed private property among mixed hardwoods and longleaf pines, I came across a barn whose timbers had been burned down, so most of the roofing tin was laying on the ground. Hoping for an <i>adamanteus</i>, I began searching under the tin.
Unfortunately, there was nothing taking refuge and thermoregulating under the warm tin. Seeing as it was not in an ideal position, I began spreading it around in strategic areas, so Tamara and Ray could come back in the future and potentially find some neat snakes under it.
I spread a few sheets out, then began to look for Tamara and Armin. I found them about 100 yards off, told them about the barn, and they came to help spread out more tin. A few minutes of that passed, and I wandered around in search of more snakes, turning up a juvenile corn snake under bark.
I took it back to Tamara and Armin, who were standing near some tin I had set out before meeting them. I showed them the corn snake, and we looked at it for a moment. Armin turned to head off, back in the direction of the barn, and stopped before he took a step and said:
"Oh my God, is that a...?!"
Not 5 feet from where we were talking, at the base of a pine tree we had all walked by several times, was this 5ft eastern diamondback curled up and calmly watching us.
It must have been there for 30minutes or more as we trampled around and bumbled by it.
Needless to say, we were all very excited to have one of our final targets of the trip come in on the third day!

The EDB:


The final day of the trip we herped our way through Mississippi. We didn't turn up anything huge, but we did find a few things. Early in the morning we flipped a hognose, and then ended up with a scarlet king, and a speckled king later in the day.


From around Houston, I turned up some of our local animals.








I met up with Ryan (DracoRJC) one day in April to go find pygmies. It turned out to be really good day, with lots of numbers. We started off the morning with about a half dozen milk snakes, of which I don't think I got any good photos of. But we did turn up my second calligaster of the year, some pretty coppers, coachwhips, and a pygmy.





One early spring weekend I drug Blake to west Texas, promising him we could have a great time flipping snakes in spring. Maybe we'd find some good stuff, and it's bound to be more fun than the redundant cut shining and road cruising that dominates the eastern Trans-Pecos herping style that you do in the summer.
I was right about it being more fun, but it didn't produce much variety. We saw coachwhips, and central texas whips, patchnose, lots of sonora and tantilla. The most interesting finds where a regal ringneck that we cruised at dusk, and a juvenile Baird's rat snake we found on a cut shortly after dark.






Another weekend I met with Armin and Brennan in central Louisiana, and we had a pretty good day. We flipped our first LA calligaster, hiked a gorgeous can, and cruised a buttermilk.





The following week, we started our "actual" spring trip, the one we had been planning since the previous October. How all the other mini-trips got started, I'll never know. This time it was four of us, and we were headed up to north Texas for massassaugas. Armin, Sean, Pat, and I met in the northeastern part of the state to look for pygs on the first day. We turned up a bunch more milks, much to everyone's delight.




We ended up spending most of our time herping in this kind of stuff, near the panhandle.


Under the rocks, we turned up tons of Variable Ground Snakes, and Blind Snakes. We got a couple of Texas Night Snakes, and some Great Plains Rats as well. The saugas we ended up cruising about one every night.










On one of the last days, we ended up with such bad weather that the only place to go was north into Oklahoma. We spent the day in the mountains hiking around. I ended up flipping a lined snake under a cow patty (no photos) and we saw a coachwhip and a couple of DOR saugas. The big attraction here was the booming boomers! Man, these lizards are something else! I'd never seen collared lizards before, and I don't think I'll ever see any better looking ones.

The rest of my spring mostly consisted of a couple hours here and there around Houston. Here's a few highlights from that time.




Another Texas glossy from the eastern edge of their range showed up for me. This time a nice large adult:













This pair of Louisiana milks was turned up one afternoon in late spring. They were huge! It was like holding a big south Texas annulata. Measuring the largest, the male, came out to right at 34 inches. I was sure I had the record, as the length listed in Werler and Dixon's texas snakes is, as I recall, 31inches. It turns out there's a more recent record of a DOR that was 35.5inches. Still, this mega-milk was exciting to see.

The female that was with him:

I don't see Slowinski's corn snakes as much as I'd like. Matter of fact, in the past couple of years I've only seen DORs. This year, I managed to find a large adult that had just been hit. She was still alive, but barely.

I took a couple of day trips to Louisiana in May. It turns out, in a certain area, the calligaster are nearly solid black (yet have light colored bellies). These were some very cool animals to see, and a fun habitat to herp. We turned up these, buttermilks, LA milks, and black rats while in search of LA pine snakes.









In early June, I made the trek to South Texas for Snake Days. Ashley, Blake, Sky and I herped together for the majority of the time. We turned up a lot of good stuff and, overall, had a lot more fun herping out there this year. We made sure to avoid the stuff around Sanderson and to the east. Finding nearly 20 snakes a night in the mountains and down by the river was a lot more fun that the couple days I spent staring at limestome bluffs all night, hoping I'd see a snake.











Much to everyone's surprise, we turned up two of these Lyre snakes, one right after the other, one night. It was exciting to see one of my favorite west Texas snakes again.


And, to top off the trip, I finally caught a porcupine! With the help of Sky, we managed to wrangle this guy, and get some photos.

Summer - 2015
Summer consisted of much less herping, though when I did go out it was focused on searching for horridus in east Texas and Louisiana. I made a couple of trips to Armin's property. It's always fun hiking up horridus in pristine hardwood forest. That said, I saw nearly as many in east Texas this year as I did out there.



















In early August, I took a weekend trip to west Texas to visit Sky and look for leps. There was no shortage of them! It was a great weekend, and I got to see some more neat crotes that I don't get to experience much.








Back out east:







This shot, "Cane Break'em" has been something we talked about doing for a long time now. We finally decided to quit joking around and actually do it this year. No snakes were harmed in the making of this pun.









Fall - 2015
With the onset of Fall, I really didn't get out much. I was too busy with my first semester of graduate school. I did manage a couple of outings, but mostly I wouldn't get out until this December.






Early Winter - 2015
With the unusually warm weather this year, I decided to make some trips down south again. Mostly, to get out and away from chemistry books, but also to visit Blake and start work on spots for next (this) year.












Happy new year and best wishes to everyone this coming herping season. Sweet Spring '16 is just a couple months away!