4.07.2005

Snakes, Snakes and More Snakes

Another busy day today. I have many pictures to share but I thought I would lump all of my snake pictures together under this post so that certain of my readers can avoid them if they wish.

We tallied five species of snake today:

  • Cottonmouth (venomous)[ Agkistrodon piscivorus ]-- only saw three
  • Brown Water Snake [Nerodia taxispilota] -- 41, and I'm sure we missed a few
  • Redbelly Water Snake [Nerodia erythrogaster] -- two
  • Black Rat Snake [Elaphe obsoleta] -- one (first one of the year)
  • Northern Water Snake [Nerodia sipedon] -- two (first ones we've seen in a few years)

I realize that some people don't like snakes and I think that is unfortunate. They are truly amazing creatures and don't deserve to be so reviled. We were delighted to see so many individual snakes out in bushes and on trees today.

2 comments:

Crystal* said...

And what do I do, you ask? Why, I look, of course. How could I not? The pictures aren't bad. My therapist says I'll be over the cottonmouth grinning sometime this month. (kidding swampy)
I've touched snakes. I think it was some big python (?) at the zoo. Harmless, so to speak. There were handlers. But these ones with TEETH, um fangs...ACK.
Copperheads and cottonmouths, OH MY! They skeer me.
Grins*

swamp4me said...

Haha, I knew you would look! But I thought I would be nice and warn you before hand. Afterall, my goal is to get you to learn to like the snakes -- not scare you away :)