Friday Files: creatures furry and scaly
This is how my day usually begins. Rambo clambers on to me and purrs himself into a stupor while I tickle him. It's a morning thing. Every. Day.
Then, as dusk approached and as we were leaving to go to our usual Friday thing, Gandalf put his foot down. Firmly.
That little snake was going nowhere. I couldn't identify it and I wasn't sure if it was playing dead (they're good at that) or really was. Dead.
Either way, it did end up. Dead.
Yes, it's snake season here. And, yes, we have nasties. We've had a couple of Cape Cobras and yes, we give them a wide berth. They usually leave of their own accord. Sometimes they don't. Boomslangs occasionally hang around. The birds tell us and then, usually, scare them into moving along.
Closer inspection of yesterday's visitor and consultation with the African Snakebite Institute website revealed this one to be a Karoo Sand Snake. The first we've seen since we moved here in late 2011.
The prettiest snake we've ever found - and there have been two, was the Spotted Harlequin snake. The last one - below - exactly five years ago today.
Until next time, be well
Fiona
The Sandbag House
McGregor, South Africa
Photo: Selma
Post script
If this post might seem familiar, it's because I'm doing two things:
- re-vamping old recipes. As I do this, I am adding them in a file format that you can download and print. If you download recipes, buy me a coffee. Or better yet, a glass of wine....?
- and "re-capturing" nearly two years' worth of posts.
- From Wordpress, I use the Exxp Wordpress plugin. If this rocks your socks, click here or on on the image below to sign up.
- Join Hive using this link and then join us in the Silver Bloggers' community.
Original artwork: @artywink
- lastly, graphics are created using partly my own photographs, images available freely available on @hive.blog and Canva.
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Can't be easy to be a snake. Everybody else either attacks you or runs away.
Well, our approach, in snake season, is to walk noisily. Then they're warned and leave because they're equally frightened.
That's what I was taught as a child too, when staying with my grandparents at their summer cottage. Children may be noisy, but running barefoot in the meadows doesn't scare any snakes! So my grandfather used to put on his huge rubber boots and stomp around for a bit every now and then.
Smart man!
Hi @fionasfavourites! Very interesting this publication. It really caught my attention that you say that hummingbirds, alert about the presence of some snake. I would like to know how do they do it? Where I live, from time to time some snake appears and maybe the birds have alerted us, but I have not been able to get that message.
All the birds get agitated. They fly about, either attacking the snake or trying to entice it away from a nest. It's the noise and that there are a lot of them flying around that gives us the message.
Thank you very much @fionasfavourites, now I will be very alert when I see birds with that behavior.