I Found a BLUE Snake In Japan! Tin Flipping, Giant Salamanders, and Urban Herping in Tokyo!

Added: 2026-06-06

[00:00:00]All right, everyone. It's the next day and we have made the drive back to the main island of Honshu. And we're going to do a little bit of snaking here during the heat of the day. It's really nice and cool today, about 65°. And then tonight, we're going to shine around some rivers and creeks and hope we see a giant salamander. So, let's get into it.

[00:00:20]>> Kind of wet.

[00:00:21]>> Yeah.

[00:00:25]Big centipede.

[00:00:27]>> Nice.

[00:00:27]>> Wow. There's a nice and big scolopindra looking dude. Not as big as some of the ones I've seen in the states, but still a unit.

[00:00:45]There's a tin stack right here.

[00:00:47]>> Hidden in the rocks in the depth of sunlight.

[00:00:53]>> It's got rocks on top of it.

[00:00:58]See if we can just go up with them. Yep.

[00:01:05]Yeah.

[00:01:07]They love the stacks.

[00:01:08]>> They do.

[00:01:12]That's crazy, dude.

[00:01:14]There we go. Our second tin stacked leodon.

[00:01:19]>> What is it?

[00:01:20]>> It's another odd tooth. Yeah. Here. I got this up. All right.

[00:01:26]These next few may just be too crumbly to really even flip.

[00:01:35]Just try and maybe get the bottom layer.

[00:01:37]>> Yeah, there's a bunch of layers here.

[00:01:42]>> Oh, that's a baby four line.

[00:01:51]All right. You want to handle the snakes?

[00:01:53]>> Yeah, hand marshall the snakes.

[00:01:56]coming for him.

[00:01:58]Got one of them. I got the other one.

[00:02:03]Okay, >> I got this. Justin, if you want to help me flip.

[00:02:14]Oh my god, that bottom.

[00:02:16]>> Oh, tiger keel back.

[00:02:19]>> What the heck, dude? Three species in one stack.

[00:02:24]Are you kidding?

[00:02:27]That's insane.

[00:02:28]>> That turned around. Are they all in shed cycles or are they >> No, I think just the just the uh fourline rat. That's ridiculous.

[00:02:37]>> All right, guys. Well, that was pretty ridiculous. We just got three snake species in the same tin stack and the uh the fourline rat bit the tiger killback right on his poison gland. So, you can actually see a little bit of this guy's poison being expressed right now. I mean, hopefully the fourline rat will be okay. Um, I doubt it's going to really cause him any issues unless he tries to actually eat this thing. But you can see this guy's actually got a bolish right there. So, we're going to put him back, let him get back to digesting that, and I'll give you guys a look at the other two snakes. So, this grumpy little four-lined ratnake is actually our only inshed snake we've seen this whole trip, and he's being particularly bitey, so we'll just put him back as well. What a crazy stack, though. I would have loved to have flipped that in its prime cuz it's like you could see the tin is just falling apart. It's been there for a hundred years. And here's a look at the leodon. This is the tiniest one uh we've seen. This is actually the tiniest individual this species I've ever seen.

[00:03:32]I'm guessing he's only a year or two old. They're not a very big snake, but this guy is so limber and skinny and small. We'll put this guy back as well and see if we can find any more tend to flip. That was sick. This guy was under this nice warm top layer of the stack.

[00:03:58]How's it looking up here?

[00:04:00]>> We got a tin stack.

[00:04:05]Okay, I got it up.

[00:04:11]She seems a little wet and shady, but you never know.

[00:04:27]Should have had a Japanese rat.

[00:04:29]>> It's on top of that other stack, too.

[00:04:35]There you go. That'll work.

[00:04:43]All right. This is a big boy snack.

[00:04:53]again.

[00:04:54]>> Really?

[00:04:55]>> Yeah.

[00:04:55]>> Old.

[00:04:58]>> I got my fingers under this tin. Let's flip it.

[00:05:00]>> Dude, it might have been a forest shed.

[00:05:09]God, dude, that looks really dry for being in the shade.

[00:05:13]>> Yeah.

[00:05:16]Where's that >> It had smooth scales, dude.

[00:05:21]>> Oh, yeah.

[00:05:24]>> Next stack, maybe.

[00:05:26]>> How far back do they go? Like, do we need to?

[00:05:31]Yeah, they go all the way back here.

[00:05:34]They're full sheets. We may just have to peek them. I don't know.

[00:05:37]>> Yeah, this is too much tin.

[00:05:48]There's another shed.

[00:05:51]All right, we got to get into this cuz it's too big and too shetty not to these come up a little easier.

[00:06:02]Oh, there's a >> big like a >> nice Maybe that's what the shed was.

[00:06:06]>> Yeah, it might be.

[00:06:07]>> I want to get it in C2.

[00:06:10]Oh my god, that is the biggest one.

[00:06:12]>> So, right after I cut the GoPro, I lifted another layer and there was yet another one. Why are these the most common snake in Japan all of a sudden?

[00:06:20]There's like two dozen snake sheds in there and at least two leodon. But the pile is just so intense. We can't even get into it. Really, really crazy. Three leodon on the day, though. All in 10.

[00:06:35]All stacks, too. All right, we'll put these really cool snakes back in their tin stack. This one actually bit Justin and left a crazy laceration. I guess they're called odd tooth snakes for a reason, and we found out why. That is so cool. That's definitely the biggest one we've seen, too. This first one is really nice. Super orange coloration on this one. And it's a fully grown adult, too. A couple of the smaller ones we've seen have had a little bit of orange on them, but this one is just fully grown.

[00:07:03]Really, really vibrant. Great looking snake. All right, back to the stack with these guys.

[00:07:15]Goodly spotted.

[00:07:18]Little scrappy piece maybe or a whole stack. You never know. Up here.

[00:07:31]This tarp under it looks pretty good.

[00:07:35]Yeah.

[00:07:41]>> What the hell, man?

[00:07:42]>> Goodness gracious. Oh, a signoffs.

[00:07:45]>> What was he under the tin?

[00:07:48]>> I think he was under this log when we moved it.

[00:07:50]>> Huh.

[00:07:52]Sick, dude. Look at that.

[00:07:55]That was cool.

[00:07:56]>> Yeah.

[00:07:57]>> All right. We just artificial cover flipped a firebelly noot.

[00:08:01]Don't do that, dude.

[00:08:04]Look at that belly.

[00:08:07]That is so unreal.

[00:08:09]He's got some good color on his tail as well. It's always hard to get them to show their bellies, but they've got very cool ones. We'll put him back.

[00:08:18]First salamander in this area. This looks promising.

[00:08:24]Just two, three, possibly more.

[00:08:35]Yeah, looked all right.

[00:08:41]But do you see that thing flopping out from the top of the tusk over there?

[00:08:45]>> If I can find somewhere to pull off here.

[00:08:49]>> It could just be uh I think you're right.

[00:08:51]>> Yeah, I was thinking about it.

[00:09:03]with a little stack with some cool beetles in it. Oh, another centipede.

[00:09:11]Oh, wow. A blue tiger killback. Holy the heck. What on earth? Why did we just flip a blue tiger killback?

[00:09:24]>> Got him. Did you check that bottom layer?

[00:09:25]>> Yeah.

[00:09:27]>> Dude, what even?

[00:09:30]That is insane.

[00:09:31]>> That is crazy.

[00:09:35]>> That is so sick.

[00:09:37]>> He's literally blue.

[00:09:46]>> A blue tiger keelback.

[00:09:48]>> What?

[00:09:49]>> Dude, you got to see this.

[00:09:52]>> Why is he blue?

[00:09:53]>> That's a great question.

[00:09:57]What the hell?

[00:09:59]Well, that is ridiculous.

[00:10:01]I knew this was a thing, but it's mostly like a melanism thing. I think it's like a lot of the times, I guess when they're fully grown, they kind of turn solid black, but when they're babies, like Have you seen pictures of adults like this?

[00:10:13]>> Uh, only a couple. That is so sick. He's literally blue.

[00:10:19]Like vibrant like turquoise. Not even turquoise. He's just bright blue. Baby blue.

[00:10:26]Look at the belly on that thing. Black and blue.

[00:10:31]That is seriously one of the coolest snakes I've ever seen.

[00:10:37]If they can look like this as adults, I think I would rather see a fully grown adult. But I feel like this thing's going to turn largely melanistic as it matures.

[00:10:46]But I don't know too much about the the progression of this color morph. This is a natural thing, though. We've seen pictures of this before. I just didn't have any idea that it was a possibility that we would actually see it in the wild. That is so unreal.

[00:11:00]We'll put him back under his tin.

[00:11:03]Can you please go back in your tin stack? He just does not There we go.

[00:11:06]Nope. Nope. Nope. He just doesn't want to go back in there. I'm going to see it. Maybe he'll I guess I'll just put him in the grass right here and he'll figure it out. Oh, there we go. Sick.

[00:11:17]Justin Justin just put his his credit card in the cash slot at the gas station.

[00:11:34]>> We have averted so many crises on this trip. That's just the latest of many.

[00:11:39]Incredible.

[00:11:41]When getting gas in Japan, the cash slot is marked with dollar with bills for future reference. Everybody, hey, we got a Jang Shaalas in the road. Look at that.

[00:11:54]Looks like a barking tree frog sitting there. Really pretty tree frog.

[00:12:02]All right, guys. We are shining this river at night. It's freezing cold, like 48°. The water is even colder. And there is a turtle. This is a Mimmy's species.

[00:12:12]I'm not exactly sure which one it is, but a very, very cool looking turtle.

[00:12:16]Yellow head. Reminds me a lot of our American wood turtles, especially with how cold this habitat he's living in is.

[00:12:21]That is awesome.

[00:12:23]Oh my goodness. Look at his tail.

[00:12:26]That is so sick.

[00:12:29]This thing is awesome.

[00:12:33]And there it is. A Japanese giant salamander.

[00:12:38]A tiny one, but a giant salamander nonetheless.

[00:12:46]That's Marshall's first one. He missed out on our trip to see them last time.

[00:12:51]That is incredible.

[00:12:55]It's beautiful.

[00:12:58]The water is kind of turbid right here, so not the best look, but we got a really good look at them last time, so just seeing one this time is more than enough.

[00:13:08]There's another one. Look at that.

[00:13:13]Another smaller one.

[00:13:18]Just hanging out right here in the shallows.

[00:13:21]There's number four just sitting there.

[00:13:27]Same size as the others. All the others have been pretty active, but this one's just kind of chilling.

[00:13:34]Really cool.

[00:13:36]Look at the habitat. It's a deep pool in this kind of small river.

[00:13:43]There's yet another one spotted from above.

[00:13:46]That one's big.

[00:13:49]There's another one. That one's gorgeous.

[00:13:53]That's the biggest one yet right there.

[00:13:55]It is >> super spotty.

[00:14:07]God, that's so sick.

[00:14:13]He's coming right towards us.

[00:14:15]Might just walk over here.

[00:14:22]Oh, that's incredible.

[00:14:58]Oh my god.

[00:15:01]There is an absolute nude party in this ditch. Look at this. We got one, two, three, four.

[00:15:10]There's number eight. Maybe the tiniest one yet.

[00:15:16]That one's just a hellbender.

[00:15:19]Just a little guy.

[00:15:22]There's number nine.

[00:15:25]And that was a wrap on an amazing and magical night walking around a beautiful stream in the mountains of Japan, looking at one of the most incredible animals in the world, the Japanese giant salamander, and plenty of nudes, too.

[00:15:38]The next morning, we had to start making our way back to Tokyo to prepare for the end of the trip. And we encountered a major roadblock. Our car wouldn't start.

[00:15:46]Either someone left the light on or there was some kind of issue with the car's battery otherwise. But the bottom line is the car wouldn't start. And on top of that, we realized we had miscalculated our shincan ride back to Tokyo. And as a result, we were pretty much completely unable to herp for a full day at the very end of the trip.

[00:16:03]But we got back to Tokyo to some fantastic weather and decided to do some urban herping on the final day of the trip. All right, we're back on our urban herping today. It's the last day of the trip and we've done it again. We've got a lizard, this time in Tokyo. This is a tacky dramus. Not a lizard we've shown very much this trip, but something we've seen a lot of.

[00:16:25]That's mostly just cuz they're really fast and hard to get video of. All right, guys. So, the end of the trip has been filled with problems up until about this point. We're walking around here in urban Tokyo. This is Marshall's neighborhood, and we're just at a little river park. This is the same river that we found our first snake in Japan at.

[00:16:44]And uh on this trip, we missed three snake species. the Japanese ratnake, the uh oddscaled snake, and the Japanese killback. And we're walking along and I notice right here, this is all overgrown. Ah, this is all overgrown rip wrap. And you'll you might notice I just screamed. And it's cuz I just got bit on the face by our first Japanese ratnake of the trip, Justin's lifer. And only the second one I have ever seen. The only one we saw last time was in shed. That is incredible.

[00:17:15]Really, really good way to end the trip here in Oh, here in Tokyo. He's a little bit grumpier than I was expecting.

[00:17:20]Goodness gracious, dude. Chill out. All right, we're going to get some photos.

[00:17:26]What a beautiful snake. And fitting to end the trip with a a snake that we have not seen very many of. And a snake that we have struggled to find in pristine habitat this whole trip, just to get one in a very narrow green belt here in Tokyo. It's only really as big as it is because this is the flood plane of the river. The flood plane ends presumably right here. And then there's like soccer fields where there's hundreds of people playing baseball over over there. What a grump.

[00:17:52]There's just an active, intense Japanese soccer game going on right there. And Justin's photographing the ratnake right here.

[00:18:02]So fun. I love urban herping. I say this all the time, but it's just a very different dynamic. And it's, you know, you typically lose a lot of diversity, but you get a lot of interesting human, reptile, nature interactions, and that's fascinating to me. That is a great way to end the trip. There's a chance we might see more snakes. Justin just lost another fourline ratnake. So, we've seen both of the species of ratnake we would expect to see here in Tokyo in this park so far within feet of each other. So, I'm going to let this guy go here in a second and we're going to see if we can find some more snakes. It's getting a little brisk. It's getting late in the day, but at least two snakes have been out in recent history. So, we're going to get back into it and see if we can find another one. It'd be cool to see a few more of these guys just since we've only seen two of them ever, and one of them was in shed. That greenish coloration is so different from anything I've ever seen. Um, not the most vibrant snakes, but there are some really cool wild blue morphs that exist and they're pretty variable to begin with. So quite a bit of variability within the species typically. And then some really crazy morphs that can be found in specific localities in the wild. Similar to the blue keelback we found earlier in this trip. A very very nice snake. Really cool to finally get to see one of these guys looking their best after our last trip failing to do so. And this entire trip failing to do so until this point.

[00:19:18]The park is too small for snakes.

[00:19:20]Marshall. Oh, this guy's really bitey. Both of the ratnake species here in Japan have been fairly bitey. At least the uh the two leafy we've seen. Very, very nice. We'll let this guy go back in his rip wrap.

[00:19:36]I got the GoPro on now, so if we see any more, hopefully I'll get the grab live.

[00:19:39]You good to release him?

[00:19:40]>> Yep.

[00:19:41]>> All right, buddy. Here's your urban snake rock pile.

[00:19:46]How deep into this did you get?

[00:19:48]>> Uh to the edge and back like this.

[00:19:50]>> Oh, you got this corner. Good.

[00:19:52]>> Yeah.

[00:20:02]Got some more.

[00:20:03]>> You got it?

[00:20:04]>> The same one?

[00:20:05]>> Yep.

[00:20:11]>> How much of them do you have?

[00:20:12]>> Uh, half, I think.

[00:20:14]>> Oh my goodness, dude. What the heck?

[00:20:17]He's huge.

[00:20:18]>> Yeah, >> I got him.

[00:20:22]He's beautiful. Yeah, he's really >> Oh my goodness. Is that the same one?

[00:20:26]>> Yeah.

[00:20:27]>> Wow, dude. He is so nice.

[00:20:31]That is unreal.

[00:20:34]Oh, that's so sick. This thing is unreal.

[00:20:39]It's so clean.

[00:20:41]Hey, dude.

[00:20:43]What's up? That head is so vibrant yellow.

[00:20:49]Look at that.

[00:20:51]All right, we're going to get some photos and we'll put him back, too. This seems to be a pretty snaky little microhabitat.

[00:20:57]That is so fantastic.

[00:21:00]Our first snake we ever found in Japan and possibly the last snake of the trip on our second trip to Japan. Also in Tokyo at a different green belt along the same river. We'll put this guy back in the rocks and see if we can score more snakes. I mean, we've we've barely moved and we found two snakes in this rock pile. So, we'll see what else we can get into. That is just just absolutely fantastic.

[00:21:24]I don't honestly I don't know how much prettier these things can get in this area. I hope there's better ones out there, but that is just really a fantastic and perfect snake. We'll see if we can improve upon that, but I'd be kind of surprised.

[00:21:39]This is a nice little wide green belt.

[00:21:41]Um, but it what's really shocking about the Tokyo area is just how much nothingness there is aside from these tiny green belts. Like there is no habitat, next to no habitat that's not in the flood plane of this river. So when it floods, these snakes are essentially forced to come up here into the tiny little soccer park area and uh to escape the flooding, I'm guessing.

[00:22:03]Yeah.

[00:22:05]And I'm sure they even get into the city parks that are even more urban than this. There's so many cool little random bugs in Tokyo. And you see people catching bugs here all the time. It's like a popular pastime among uh young Japanese people and old Japanese people alike to just walk around with a little bug net and catch and inspect all the cool bugs they have here.

[00:22:26]>> It's the inspiration for Pokémon, right?

[00:22:27]>> Yeah, I think that's what Marshall was saying. And that's like where the idea for Pokémon came from. Here's a grass are basking in the same rock pile. I'm guessing these are what the rat snakes are hunting. that and any rodents that are down in these same rocks.

[00:23:00]>> Oh, I got a Japanese rat basking.

[00:23:02]>> Yep, I see it.

[00:23:04]>> Wow. Oh my god. He's in shed.

[00:23:09]There is our second Japanese rat just coiled up basking. I'm going to try to get an incu. That is awesome.

[00:23:17]>> And I think if if we Oh, never mind.

[00:23:18]He's moving. All right. Should I grab him?

[00:23:25]All right. Hey, buddy. Our first our second inshed snake of the trip. Come back.

[00:23:33]How? What? What's happening here? Stop that. Goodness.

[00:23:38]There we go. All right.

[00:23:42]That's sick.

[00:23:43]>> Nice.

[00:23:43]>> He looks like a prairie king.

[00:23:46]All right. Third snake of the afternoon and our second Japanese ratnake of the day. Only my third one ever. And uh two of them have been today here in Tokyo.

[00:23:55]Really, really ridiculous and really interesting and cool to see. Such good snake numbers here in such an urban park in uh one of the largest cities in the world. really really cool. It's a fascinating intersection here between snakes and people and uh how they use such heavily altered uh habitat. I mean, this entire thing is pretty much man-made. There's a little bit of natural flow here to the river, but you can see they've got this giant I guess this is a flood barrier and uh these snakes are just living in the concrete structure and man-made rock piles along it.

[00:24:29]We'll put this guy back. Might be the last snake of the day. We ran out of our nice rock pile, but we'll circle back through one more time and see if we see anything else we missed.

[00:24:37]All right, buddy. Here you go.

[00:24:42]And just like that, it was pretty much time to wrap up our final day in Japan and get ready to head home. My first trip to Japan was awesome. This trip was even better. It was just absolutely unbelievably cool to flip snakes under 10 in good numbers and lay eyes on some of the most incredible salamanders and habitats in the world. Doing a more salamander and tin focus trip has been something I've wanted to do for a long time. So, massive thanks to Justin and Marshall for helping to make this trip happen. I couldn't have done it without either of them. And make sure to let me know in the comments if you enjoyed this series. I definitely think this has been one of my favorite, if not my favorite videos I've made on this channel, just because of the array of insane things we saw over the course of the last few days of the trip. And on top of that, I get to return home and it's still springtime. So, I'm looking forward to much more action in Georgia. Thank you guys so much for watching this Japan series and I will see you all in the next one.

[00:25:42]Heat. Heat. N.