Tuesday, March 20, 2012

SNAKES EVERYWHERE!!

Click on pictures to ENLARGE!
We hit the walking trail yesterday and came across two baby snakes that we almost mistook for twigs. Yikes!
You should of seen us after that. Our eyes were glued to our feet watching each step we took.
Now fast forward to today and it gets even better.


We hit the trail, walked to our turning point and saw nothing...not one dang snake. Hmm, we were kinda hoping to see one again. (You know it's not often that we see snakes living here in town.)
We turned around and headed back to the truck.
Just as we came to the wooden bridge we got a big surprise...actually a lot of little surprises.
We stepped onto the bridge and immediately a little snake slithered out in front of us. 
We backed up and as I did I heard a bunch of noise coming from the grassy area just before the bridge.
OH MY!
There were snakes EVERYWHERE!
They were all over in the grass and leaves. Each one measured anywhere from 1 1/2 to 2 feet in length.  They were slithering up the little hill towards the walking path and then I noticed this writhing ball of nastiness. 
It was a huge tangle of snakes rolling around. (I'd guess there to be 15-20 snakes rolling around in that ball.)You could see more snakes coming up the hill and as soon as the reached the top they immediately shot over to the tangled mess and joined in. 
Eeeewwwww!
As I grabbed for my cell phone to try to get a few pictures I told Katie to watch my feet. Do NOT take you eyes off of my feet and yell as soon as you see one coming towards me.
I have never seen that many snakes in one place before so I was totally amazed. Oh and it made a pretty interesting learning experience for the both of us because we came home and hopped on the internet to find out what kind of snakes they were and when and how they mated.
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia
 We learned that they were just plain ol' Garter Snakes with red tongues which I thought was kind of neat looking.
Typically they come out of hibernation between May & June here in WV and soon after they go on the hunt for a partner to mate with. With the unusually warm weather that we've been having (80's today) the snakes have come out of hibernation early. The boy snakes tend to gang up on the females and when & if you find a ball of them all entwined like we did today more than likely there is one female in the center and all the rest are males. 


Now would you like to play find and seek and see if you can find the snakes? You will have to click on the pictures to enlarge them and remember these were taken on a cell phone so they aren't the best quality.
Look at the first picture and see if you can find them and then scroll down to see if you got them all right.
I found 4
Scroll
down 
to see
them!


While we were watching all the little ones on the ground there was a bigger one lurking in the tree.
                                  It was a blacksnake .
Here's one last picture and they've already been circled.
As much as I don't like snakes I have to admit that it was pretty neat to see all of those today.


10 comments:

annie said...

I hate those things,they race across your feet, They have their uses, many good ones, but being my friend is not one of them. My husband said to tell you when they take the Boy Scouts into the woods to hike, they spray those head sweat bands with turpentine, and put them around their boots, so the snakes won't get on them. They always travel in pairs too.,, yeyyweeyyy.

Barb said...

wow, that was some excitement! So pleased you had the presence of mind to snaps some pics.

Janet said...

Wow! I am really not a snake lover, but that is interesting. I have never seen so many all at once before.

Bees yes. Snakes nope.

I hope they didn't follow you home.

Take care, Janet W

Sharon said...

Interesting, but I hope never to see a bunch like that. We are practically surrounded by woods where we live and yesterday Hubby was cleaning out around some bushes and saw a baby snake slither off. I'm afraid we are all in for a bunch of bugs and snakes this year. Ugh!

Angela said...

Yikes Jessica! I would have left out of their running and screaming and probably fall down! lol

I'm afraid this year is going to be a bad year for snakes and bugs!

I see my surgeon today to take out the staples and find out more about what I have to do from here.

Carmen S. said...

AAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!! *running away screaming* there is NO WAY you would ever catch me at that trail again, OH MY GOSH, I hate snakes!!!!! I got the willies up my back just looking at these pics:O

Cheryl said...

Have to say, I can not and do not deal with snakes at all. Black, silver or gold, they must die if I'm around them.

When we had our old barn pushed down I found several snakes at the back door and on the tree at back. One even crawed in my wheel and beat the side of my car going down the road trying to escape.

With all this I ended up in the heart unit. Heart was racing all the time and could not get them off my mine.

Robin at The Primitive Hutch said...

I don't really like snakes either.
There are a lot along the creek bed behind our house ~ when the creek dries up they come up to the house looking for water.
I've never seen them in a ball like that. Very interesting!!!
Thanks for all the info on them!
Always nice to learn something new!
Prim Blessings
Robin

black bear cabin said...

glad the snakes were harmless...its always scary to stumble upon them....but sounds like you and your daughter had quite an adventure! and a fun lesson was learned too :)

Granny Sue said...

I'm squirming just looking at these pictures! These are "good" snakes, but even so it makes me uneasy to see so many in one place. And I don't usually mind snakes at all!