More Snakes

I hesitate to write this post because I fear that friends and family may decline to visit after reading this ...

Last month I wrote a post about snake skins we've found. Shortly after that post, another large snake skin showed up at the edge of the concrete "patio" under our deck. (Another rat snake skin.)

Snakes are good -- they eat the mice that plague our shed.

Last week, this handsome fella was hanging around:

This rat snake / black snake was about 5 feet long -- possibly the former owner of one of two shed snake skins we've found this spring.

A nice close-up of the head.

Yesterday, while hanging up laundry, I almost stepped on this one:

Lon has seen this snake before -- it has a burrow under the concrete pad under our deck. At first I feared it might be a copperhead (very venomous!), but it's more likely to be a juvenile rat snake which can have this coloration. (The head isn't triangular enough to be a copperhead, and it lacks the two "pits"on the top of the head behind the eyes. I couldn't see the shape of its pupils.)

Today was more disturbing:

Lon heard a timber rattlesnake under the shed while he was getting out equipment. Later, it had coiled up next to the ramp to the shed. It clearly didn't like us coming and going. Lon threw a piece of wood at it and it slithered back under the shed. I hate killing snakes, but if this one continues to hang around, it may have to go.

'Nuf said!