This is the time of year that the evenings are starting to cool off a bit, maybe it is not still 105 degrees at 8 pm. I love sitting on the porch with my red vice and watching the dog or catching up on the news. But this week, I have been joined by more of nature's friends than I could have ever expected. Two days ago, this is what I observed.
This was my first visitor. My experience from the ranch tells me that when you see turtles and/or snakes (reptiles) moving, rain is coming. And I'll be darned if we didn't have a few sprinkles that day and a quarter of an inch yesterday.
A couple of fun facts about turtles.
A) They are a staple of most human diets in the Cayman Islands. Ick.
B) It is illegal to sell turtles under 4 inches long in every state in the United States.
So in case you had some small turtles you planned on selling, you can't... Okay, dang.
To set the record straight, I am not a snake lover, and they are not welcome on my porch right by the door!!! It just can't be tolerated, especially when you are as old as I am, and this is not a type of snake I have EVER seen in this part of the world. For the most part, I don't hyperventilate when I see a snake. I try to keep my composure, because I believe the people who say, "they are more afraid of you than you are of them." I used to kill every snake I saw, with my car tire (spin-out) or a shovel. But then it was explained to me that the circle of life is such that if we allow the good snakes to live, then we don't have yucky mice in our house, because the snakes always eat them before they can get inside. Yeah, well, I bought into that, and I don't lose my mind every time I see a snake.
We live in the city limits, for goodness sake!
I realize the snake looks huge, but let me clarify, it was tiny. Tiny, like a pencil that is ten inches long. Tiny, like that is a regular flat head screwdriver that is holding it. I probably stepped over it 8 times walking in and out and around the porch before Mike showed up and said, "did you see that snake behind your chair?"
Uhm, NO!
The little guy got lucky, and he was set free down by the church, as it is affectionately called (because a wedding was held there), at our house. So those guys showed up two nights ago.
(The picture is blurry, but you can tell what it is. Would you have gotten closer?)
Then last night, Clare starts barking incessantly at something on the back porch. It is echoing into the house, she is not pointing her bark into the yard. I go out there, because I figure it is a beetle or maybe a june bug. Nope. It has a black furry head. That's all I can see. My imagination does not run amuck. I anticipate that it is a cat, maybe wild, but Mike is in charge of security, so he was summoned. When he moved the flower pots, etc., that it was hiding behind, he could clearly see that it was a skunk. We have no idea why it wasn't spraying. Usually at the first sign of a dog or other antagonistic animal, they will spray. This one looked kind of small. Maybe a baby? My thought is that they carry rabies, so if he knows what is good for him, he won't be there in the morning. We are giving him every chance to just go.
Go in peace, skunk, go.
Gosh, I'm glad Clare didn't get sprayed. We've been there, and it's ugly.
I know I mentioned this, but I want to reiterate -- we live in town!
