Tropical Adventures

Well, I have been meaning to mention all the critters we have seen since our arrival in the deep South. The insects alone have been a new experience for James, who is accustomed to the Dutch insect diversity. Nothing against the Netherlands, but it is hard to compete with the swampy nearly tropical biodiversity of South Georgia. Since our arrival we have seen dozens of insects and other invertebrates, including spiders (wolf, jumping, and my favorite, the spiny crab-like orb weaver), bees, butterflies (whites, skippers and two swallowtail varieties), beetles (ladybird, stag, scarab to name a few), and more. And we have not been looking for bugs yet, we've just run into all of these. In the vertebrate category we have enjoyed Bammy and Peppy's yard full of squirels, birds, and anoles.

But honestly today took the cake. This morning after breakfast I heard Bammy calling from downstairs with a funny sound in her voice. I brought James down the stairs to hear that Bammy had a snake in her bathroom. I asked first if she heard it rattling, she said no. So, I went in to check it out. It was a little bitty thing, possibly a black racer jeuvenile. I should be able to identify a snake, after my two plus years working for the snake master Dr Fauth in Charleston. As my Aunt Nanny said (because you know my mom called both my sisters and hers immediately), "Katharine should be able to get it, didn't she use to work in a snaketorium?" We actually call it the National Forest, but you get the idea. But anyway, I can only tell you if a snake is venomous or not-- I just stick to the basics. I knew it wasn't a rattler and it wasn't a moccasin. Venomous or not, I do not pick up unknown snakes with my bare hands.

So, I look down, only to find this guy heading straight for my mom's closet. James, my mom amd I are all there either shoeless or in flip flops. So we all went off to put on close toed shoes (except Bammy, whose shoes were in the closet) and then Bammy tried to entertain James while I looked for this little guy. My mother's closet is a walk-in, but as she is vertically challenged there are lots of things in the bottom half of the closet. It is stuffed really. I found some gloves, then tried to get him out from behind some storage boxes. Long story short, eventually I couldn't find him anymore and felt pretty confident he'd gone out through the other closet door (conveniently located behind a chest of drawers with wrapping paper and a sewing machine on top if it). It had been about an hour of me, 7 months pregnant, getting up and down from the ground and looking under stuff, and I hadn't seen him in quite a while. I took off the gloves and asked my mom what we could organize while I was here. Of course I am a bit of an organizer anyway, plus pregnant-- I was ready to go. So, she found a few boxes we felt she wouldn't need access to in the near future and I put them on the topmost shelf. Then I sat down and helped put all her shoes up in their little cabinet. By this time my mom, James and I are ALL in the closet. If you want to write a recipe for getting a snake to appear, that has to be it.

So, the snake pops out by my mother's (still uncovered) foot-- she "Lord --Jesus'd" her way across the floor as the snake made its way behind her into the bathroom. James was behind me on a stepladder in the closet, so I moved mom aside and put on the gloves. The snake went through the bathroom toward my dad's closet. Did I mention James has been saying "Bammy's snake-- Bammy's snake" on and off for the last hour?

Just as he was heading under my dad's closet door I put a glove on him and got him to stop. Of course thick gloves make it hard to grip anything, and that poor snake emptied his entire excretory system on the floor. Bless his heart, he was probably very frightened. So, then I asked Bammy to find her camera, because I knew I wanted a photo of this event. To be perfectly honest, we placed him near the legendary T-bone's fence. We didn't dump the snake over his fence, but after discussion, we thought he would be happier in that area of the yard.

Unfortunately the photos are not stellar. Rack that up to the excitement of Bammy (our photographer)