Serpentine Adventures

It appears that finally spring is on its way.  The snow is melting rapidly, the birds are back, the babbling brooks are flowing freely and fast.

The ground has begun to thaw as is evidenced by the quick  disappearance of the spring run off.  Soon   frogs who have been abed deep in the  mud  bottomed swamps  will arise once again to add to the richness of sound and activity in the freshly thawed and life laden natural world.

Besides the appearance and throaty songs of frogs and tadpoles back into our wildlife rich environment there will be another who will soon make their presence known..if not necessarily heard..and certainly never comfortably felt. 

 I am , of course, referring to the snake population.

Now I KNOW that the type of snake that inhabits the part of our world is the most harmless in creation, and indeed considered by some to be very important to our environment.  There are those who consider them to be quite lovely in colour and form.  Some also think them graceful in their swiftness and silence.

PAS MOI!

My earliest recollection of snakes is  at the old well in front of my Grandpa's house.  It used to be a bit of a Sunday afternoon sport to catch snakes as they crowded around the shallow well covered in rocks.  Grandma used to have to take her broom and swoosh snakes off her cement steps on a sunny afternoon.

When we first moved to our farmyard 30 years ago there was a population of snakes that came out from their winter home along the outside of our cement foundation every spring.  It always gave me the creeps to think that  in a space of about 8" with only a bit of hardened but porous rock  in between, there probably  were about 40 or more snakes curled up sleeping for the winter.  I could only hope that the 50 year old plus foundation had few cracks and that those would be either too deep into the ground or too narrow for any would be reptilian visit to occur.

My husband's family seems not to share my dislike of these legless creatures.  He has recounted an incident when he was driving up to his sister's farmhouse and seeing his two nieces squealing while scrambling and jumping up and down   each with a half dozen snakes in their hands.  He called out, " Drop them. You'll be okay."  They replied, "No! No! They are getting away."  Another time he recalls his 12 year old  niece who was about 10 feet away from him yelling at him to Stop!  He immediately did so and looked down to see a snake at his feet--tied with a lasso around its neck.  (She was taking her snake for a walk and he had nearly stepped on it.)   

My children, too, did express some interest in snakes--albeit mostly of the plastic wiggly type bought in cheap discount stores.  I know this because there was this one particular black plastic snake that seemed to show up in various places in the basement--sometimes by the the washing machine--sometimes by the bedroom door.  Once it was even found on my bed much to their delight and mine own horror.

I had thought this idea of sneaky snakiness had only been confined to our own family, but , alas,  so it seems that I was in error.

I recently told my daughter that I was going to meet a friend of the family in the city, to which my daughter pleasantly replied that I should be sure to remember her to my friend and to say "Hello".

 This lovely young lady of 22  continued on to say, (Oh indeed, it all became so crystal clear as to why my friend has not visited for nearly ten years) "Ask Yvette if she remembers the black snake we put into her purse the last time she visited."