I am not fond of snakes. Snakes are, at best, creepy and, at worst, deadly. So I avoid them. This, however, has not always been my opinion.
As a youngster I found grass snakes and garter snakes fascinating and often made (temporary) pets of them. Much to my mother’s chagrin.
In one elementary school science class it was a special privilege afforded only to the top students to “wear” the class boa constrictor for a portion of each class period. I kept my grades up more for this badge of honor than for academics sake.
It was a Sunday evening, we had all had our dinner, the dogs had had their Race Day treats. They went out on the porch to lounge in the cool evening air while Marie and I finished watching the NASCAR cup race at Richmond.
The dogs started barking. It sounded like other dogs were barking too, so I assumed they were just conversing. Dogs do that. But then the intensity stepped up and I decided to go see what they were barking at.
The porch light was enough to see they had a snake “surrounded” out in the driveway. It wasn’t very big, hard to say for sure because it was coiled up, but probably 12-18”. Not that it makes any difference: if it’s a viper, the little snakes are just as venomous as the big ones. More-so, really because they have not learned to meter out their venom by threat level like the bigger snakes will. If it was non-venomous it won’t hurt them, but I’d rather they didn’t kill it. I was barefooted and in my PJ’s; not proper snake wrangling attire in either case.
I went back in to get a flashlight. In the added light I could tell from the porch it was a copperhead. Until I came out the dogs were just playing chicken with it. Once I was on scene Cochise went into “Protector Mode” and started attacking the snake; and taking hits from it. Four… five… six, this is very bad! Continue reading “Showdown with a Snake”
