So, this snake had set up camp in the backyard right outside the window near the house. It no longer lives there. Two weeks ago, dad came up to my room because he'd found a snake in the back yard. I like seeing things in nature, if it isn't horrible, so no mauled to death animals or something. Like once The Sister found a fox skull and showed it to me. Sadly her dog had killed the fox and by the time she found the remains it was just a skull that was pretty clean. So, no dead and mangled fox, but a clean fox skull? Sure!
So, anyways, dad was all, "I'm pretty sure it's not poisonous." (which I wanted to correct him and say venomous and state the difference between the two, but I didn't.) and I actually got really quite close to it (a foot or two) to take pictures that day. It was alive, but didn't move, but it was already pretty cold that day. A few days later, I was trying to research exactly what kind of snake it was. For the record, the colouring and pattern of this snake, I never did find. The first pictures I took, his head was a little squished up (not to strike), so I couldn't be sure of his head and neck shape. But from the side view I could tell he did not have a rounded mouth area, which was in poor favour for him to being of the a non-venomous variety. People online said it was a Cotton Mouth or Water Moccasin (same snake, just two different names). Still, I didn't want to be too hasty saying it was venomous, if it wasn't. I wanted to be absolutely certain. There were others online who said it was not venomous. Yesterday I saw it again. I hadn't been looking for it, but yesterday I was. I took another photo (the one you see above) and it is unmistakable. The "neck" is smaller than the head and the head forms a triangle. He's venomous. Sure I worry for us, but really I was more worried about the cats. We know he's there, so if he weren't to come out of that area, we'd know to keep clear of him. The cats won't think like that. They'll wander over there or it'll move and they'll go to attack it and then we'd have a dead cat. Then I would kill that snake and be unconsolably upset that our cat had died, when I could have prevented it. I tried researching how to remove a snake safely. I was thinking I could, with the proper information and education, relocate it safely (for me and him) to the woods behind our house. No one online would tell me how to properly handle a venomous snake, or any snake for that matter. 01. Call an exterminator - can't do, it costs money. 02. Clean up the areas where you know snakes want to live (wood piles, leaf piles, rock piles) - OK, can't, because there's a venomous snake in there! 03. They want to eat vermin, so exterminate the other vermin first. OK, but there is a venomous snake right there and my cats keep coming outside. I don't have time for that right at this second. Next! 04. Mulch with natural, but uncomfortable to slither across items such as eggshells, pine cones, holly leaves. Good to know, but if I do that now, he'll just be trapped and it still doesn't solve my problem. 05. Purchase snake repellant that has a smell they can't stand. OK, costs money so no, and also what smells do they not like? Because if I have that smell already I could use that. Is the repellant safe or harmful for cats? In the end, dad's idea was to kill it. I'd really hoped to avoid that. I want him to live, venomous or no, I just don't want a possibility that he'll kill my cats because he's doing what snakes do. I told mom earlier to let dad know (because I didn't know where he was) that I'd spotted it again, in rather the same place. It was awfully small though, so he might not want to shoot it. The Sister had just seen it today and exclaimed, "Oh! He's so tiny! I thought he was much larger." to which I said, "I kept trying to tell y'all he was tiny, perhaps a baby.", so this is why I mentioned to mom that it was tiny, though now I'm not sure why because it's not like dad hadn't seen it first. I was hungry, I don't know. Anyways, so I go upstairs and I'm reading The Hobbit and enjoying my lunch when I hear a loud POP! for outside. 'Oh the poor snake....' I thought. Then again, POP! and a few seconds later another POP! "What is going on down there?!?" I had visions that the snake was flying through the air striking at dad or else once he's shot the first one, thousands more sprang out of the leaves for an attack. I know neither of these are the natures of snakes, but it's what ran through my mind during the six (yes, six) shots that dad fired off for one tiny snake. So, I left my lunch and my story and hurried downstairs. All of the cats had wide eyes because they too wondered what all that noise had been about. Went to the basement and dad had just come in. "Is everything alright?" "Yes" "Then why six shots?" "I killed the snake." "Was it flying after you or were there more?!" He laughed a little, "No, just the one snake." OK.... Finally upstairs in the kitchen he gave the entire, albeit very short, story. He'd intended to shoot the snake in a certain spot (I knew this would have been the head), but mom's practically bouncing around like some unintelligent and annoying child and clamouring to ask questions she doesn't even want the answers to, and keeps asking, "Where did you want to shoot it? Where did you want to shoot it?" until he has to actually state it, or rather he says, "Here" and just points to his own head. Mom hates all snakes and wants even the harmless King Snake that lives in our barn dead, because she'd hollered, "Kill it! Kill it! Kill it!" when she found out about it. She doesn't even go to the back yard and it's not going to hurt any of us. She was also jumping around exclaiming, "Where is the snake now? Which fence? In the road?" She doesn't want, nor need, to know the answers, she's just being annoying and making the situation worse. Anyways, so dad hit the snake with the first shot, but not in the head. The other four shots also missed the mark, though hit the snake. The final one was where it should have gone in the first place. Dad doesn't like or enjoy killing things and he's usually of excellent aim (but then the head of this snake was the size of a nickel, if that, which is why I was thinking that shooting it seemed a bit extreme, but oh well.), and I took his answers without question because I knew he didn't want to talk about it. His exact words were "I'd intended a place to shoot it, I shot it, but not in the place and so we had six shots." He didn't want to elaborate or explain, and really there was no need because I knew what he meant. If he'd known how to safely remove the snake, it's what he would have done as well, but he didn't and the risk was too great. He'd wanted to then end the life of the snake as quickly and as unmessily as possible and hadn't succeeded, but was going to continue until he was sure the snake wasn't still alive but in some sort of misery. I know it's a weird post for a blog, but though something had to be done, I still feel badly that the snake had to die. I needed to express this and get it off my chest and say a sort of farewell to him. And it bothered me that he snapped at me before this. When I told him I'd seen the snake again yesterday evening, took a photo even, and it is venomous, he wanted me to take his pistol and a box of shells downstairs, so they'd be handy (for him) when I saw it again. I'm not partial to guns, and there's also a bit of a hang up. For his birthday one year, I took him to a gun show, because I thought he would like it. Some guy encouraged me to pick up one of the guns for sale. I know how to handle them, and you're never supposed to point them at anyone, no matter what, because a gun you think isn't loaded could be. Dad nodded to say 'sure, go ahead'. I picked it up gently, wasn't pointing it at anyone, just feeling the weight in my hand, and the guy was all, "Woah lady! Be careful, you never point a gun at anyone!" and dad stood there looking ashamed that I could do this to him in public, when I'd done nothing wrong. He acted liked I'd picked it up, waved it around, yee-hawed, pointed it at people, and pretended to shoot it. Dad's reaction was that I had done the same thing. I was so mad and upset. Now he wants to take his pistol everywhere with him or he'll just retrieve one from a drawer and he's being careless and not taking heed if I'm in the way, or one of the cats. Really? And I was chastised publicly about this very thing, even though I hadn't done it? So, if they're so dangerous and you're not too point them, or have them pointed even if it's a sweeping motion, and you do that with the cats, then it makes me cringe. He's not purposefully pointing it at the cats, but in order to check the gun, or get it out of its holster he'll absentmindedly have it pointed at me or one of the cats that's nearby. Today he did this and it was pointed at Poe who was sleeping on the bed. It made me cringe, because it made me nervous, and he got really angry and spat, "Don't act like you're shy around a gun!" It took me aback so I spat back, "I can feel any damn way I wish to feel!" It upset me because it sounded like irrational emotion, like when he's heard too much conservative talk radio about a certain issue and something later is said that might or might not even pertain to that issue and he gets all overly emotional and high and mighty. That's what it sounded like. Like he keeps hearing too much about "Snow flakes" and being scared of guns, and was something he'd just listened to, and then he's misinterpreting my cringe at his lack of gun safety (that he fucking taught me) as being some stereotype of the pansy ass democrat who shakes in their Tom's at the sight of a gun. But, now I'm thinking it could also have been the fact that he knew he was going to have to kill something when he didn't really want to do it. Not that he should snap at me for either reason (and he certainly shouldn't have been ashamed to be seen in public with me that day at the gun show!), but I'd at least have some sympathy if it was this latter reason.
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AuthorA girl from South Mississippi who finds herself in exploration. Archives
November 2019
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