First off, I want to apologize for the crappy pictures. Since there would be slim chance at lifers, the only camera I hiked with was my phone.

After what seems like an eternity, I finally returned to the Ouachitas. After taking off work a couple hours early Melissa and Wyatt picked me up at the zoo and we headed toward Mena. We had all intentions of camping Monday and Tuesday nights, but mother nature had other plans. We drove through some pretty crazy rain almost all the way to Mena. So we decided to just crash at a hotel. While there, we flipped on the weather to see all the tornadoes buzzing through AR. It dawned on me what time Jonathan was leaving Jonesboro to meet us. I did the math and he was very close to death! I ran outside to call him to find out he was just north of Jacksonville while the tornado was going through Cabot. He had to pull over because there was zero visibility. I informed him that the tornado was only a few miles north of him and he should get back on the road as soon as he could see.

Fast forward to yesterday. We decided to grab lunch then head to the mine shafts (my former study site for those that don't know). On our way, we were pretty unsure about the flooding so weren't too optimistic. All the streams were swollen, but not as bad as I expected. While hiking up to the mines, the "small" runoff stream had a decent amount of water running down. As we got to the mines, I saw this:

This waterfall is typically nothing more than a VERY small trickle. When I saw that, I knew that both mines would be flooded. Since it had been 3 or 4 years since I'd been there, I still had to climbed in to check things out. Only thing I found was a lot of water. Since there was a now massive stream rushing between our location and the "easy" spot for our 1st target, we took our time hiking back down to flip a few rocks. It only took a few minutes to find 2 Caddo Mtn. Salamanders, 1 Ouachita Dusky Salamander, and 1 Prairie/Mississippi Ringneck.

Since Jonathan had to leave by the end of the day, we didn't stick around to find numbers. Our next target took us NE of Mena. After a pretty good drive, we made a wrong turn (realized it after only 1/2 mile) which turned out to be a good thing because we spotted this Mississippi Mud Turtle crossing the road after we turned around. We aren't too sure about its hunchback look.

We quickly got onto the road we were shooting for and were at our destination in no time. After only a few minutes, Jonathan had flipped a few Western Slimy Salamanders.

It took us at least 20 minutes of hard searching to turn up 2 Fourche Mtn. Salamanders.

Along the way we turned up several Southern Redback Salamanders, but unfortunately the only pic I took turned out to be out of focus.

Again, we weren't after numbers, so as soon as we each had found a Fourche, we headed back toward Mena. Up Rich Mtn we go to attempt to complete the trifecta. Well since Rich Mtn. Salamanders were easy I figured we would strike out on them, lol. Boy was I wrong. The second rock I turned had this one staring back at me.

After about 10 minutes, Jonathan and I had turned up 11 without breaking a sweat. I took one last picture of this attractive individual before heading back to the car.

We left Mena after a quick lunch around 11:00. Only 6 hours and 100 miles later, we had completed our mission. We didn't find a high number of species and I can't speak for everyone involved, but I think we had a GREAT day. Hopefully our next trip down there will have a little more cooperation from mother nature and we will actually get to camp and turn up a few more goodies along the way.