Packing day, beautiful, sunny in the 80's, much like NY City.
Skip enjoyed his Jet Blue plane trips and time with his kids in MA. He is off at the Waffle House with Kay and Neil for breakfast. I just successfully balanced my checking account. I'm about to clean out the refrigerator, except for dinner stuff, throw or pack clothes, books, papers and collectibles into bags. If the Buick is overwhelmed there is always UPS, a route many people take.
If there were only more time...... I'd photograph some wonderful, (recent purchases are always wonderful, aren't they?,) in-expensive, but can't-live-without purchases. The fake snowy owl, looking like a stuffed owl, probably made out of pigeon feathers, with bright yellow eyes, perched on a fake log. ($15.00) It replaces or stands in for the painting that hung in the kitchen at 11 Spruce, the Beardsell of the Snowy Owl, primitive style, not exactly folk art. I think Virginia Beardsell was a trained artist. I hoped the family would leave a couple of her paintings, but I understand why they didn't. A WELCOME ABOARD life preserver, priceless, but actually ten or fifteen bucks. Other five to fifteen dollar items. The Weiner-mobile plastic bank was a great find. Years ago, in the 70's when I was collecting stuff, good stuff, postcards, photo cards, photographs, books, etc. a friend and I opined about the fact that someday people would be collecting plastic.
Back in the 70's postcards could be bought for $0.10, that's right ten cents. Now any slightly interesting card I've seen lately is a few dollars. Never thought I'd be the person talking about the good old days or as it's said now, "In the day." They weren't necessarily good old days. They were simply different days. As in, it is different now than it was then.
Cutting this short. Terrific day alone yesterday birding the North end of Fort DeSoto with many male, hooded (look it up in a bird book to get a visual, Olive back,Bright yellow underneath with a (duh) black hood, yellow cheek patch, much brighter in real life than in books, the contrast between the yellow and black is striking)warblers hopping around on the ground, in the trees at eye level or below. Beautiful views of Prarie warblers, bright yellow black stripes on their sides. White-eyed vireos, male and female. Bald Eagle, yellow crowned Night Heron, Reddish Egret doing its feeding dance, White ibis, wood storks, King birds, a Brown-crested flycatcher, a life bird for me and the best sighting of the day, nearly - a yellow rat snake.
It crawled out from behind a small palm tree, stretched itself across the dirt path many beachgoers were taking to the beach. I took some photos I'd like to send to you, if I only could get this blog/photo thing to work. I guarded the snake, knowing some, (I'll try to be nice) "kindly" old guy would come over and try to beat it to death with a stick.
The not-so-kindly grey-haired elderly "gentleman" came over as predicted, picked up a stick and began to poke at the snake. I spoke up, "You wouldn't like someone poking you with a stick, would you?" (I could have chosen my words better, but I was speaking first, thinking later) He looked at me, not too kindly.
He thought it might be poisonous. He was going to save others from getting hurt. I told the man, "This snake has as much right to live as we do. They are beneficial creatures. I don't think it is poisonous. I think we should leave it alone."
He, at his wife's urging went off looking disappointed, his opportunity to help others, poke a snake and who knows what defeated. As he left he said over his shoulder to me, "If someone steps on that snake, gets bitten and dies, it will be your fault."
I said, "That doesn't make a lot of sense."
At that point a nice family arrived, father, mother, a couple of kids. I suggested they walk around the snake. The woman said, "I hate snakes!" Not helpful. Everyone walked around.
As I stood there wondering what I was going to do a man came rushing up in a white shirt all excited. He had seen the snake from a distance. The snake was about three feet long, yellow and brown stripes totally spread across the path, maybe a couple of inches around, sort of. Other people went around, this guy started talking. He used to catch snakes as a kid, brought one in the house which crawled into his mother's bed. he was grounded for two weeks, etc.
Turns out his name is Mark. He's 54. I don't know why he told me that, except he mentioned that in relation to the fact he was out trying to get in shape, doing his "thousand steps" when he was accosted by three black men. "I try not to stereotype ( I think he said), but when that happens......" Luckily, he switched his thoughts back to the snake.
"I can pick it up and get it out of the way, where it won't get hurt," he said. "Hooray," I thought. I like snakes, but I have little expertise picking them up.
He picked up a stick, but he gently persuaded it to move out of the path. I had nudged it's nail to get it to move a little earlier, but it seemed quite content on the white, sand path. The snake coiled up, raised it's head and looked a little threatening. About then a huge truck pulled up with a park worker in it. Mark, optimistic Mark, thought the park guy would come over and help the snake. The park guy didn't like snakes. He was there to cut up some tree that had fallen somewhere nearby.
The snake, which I surmised might be a rat snake, too big for a garter snake, had come out in the sun and it almost looked like it had a diamond pattern inside the brown stripes on its side. "That could by a pygmy rattlesnake," the park worker informed us. "Did you see the signs about rattlesnakes over in the trees?"
I had spent the last two hours walking around in sandals under the trees, looking up at birds, occasionally down to avoid the fire ant mounds. I had seen no snakes and no signs about rattlesnakes. Facing off against a pygmy rattlesnake sounded like a bad idea to me, but Mark was undeterred. "Stay where you are," he shouted, I've got something in the trunk." He ran off. I stood by the snake, out of striking distance, I hoped.
He returned with some snorkel equipment, a white plastic bag and his cell phone. "Would you take a picture of me and the snake?" he asked. "I want to show this to my wife." "Of course, " I replied.
Mark, whose name I did not know yet, positioned himself near, but not too near to the snake. In the view finder of his cell phone I could not see the snake. I told him that. He seemed very dejected. "I'll take some photos with my camera and send them to you," I told him. "Would you?" "Great."
Hoping this was not a pygmy rattlesnake or if it was I was hoping this guy, Mark, was not going to be bitten by it, I positioned myself, as best I could to get the two of them in the photo. I took one, Mark didn't have his glasses, couldn't see in my viewfinder. I took another.
Just after the photo session, a woman approached me, seeing the binos around my neck, my long pants, long-sleeved shirt, etc. "Where were you seeing the long-billed curlew today?" she asked. I told her I remember where it was seen a couple of years ago. She smiled. "There are so many people on the beach I doubt it is in this vicinity," I suggested. She agreed and went off in another direction. She told me it had been sighted two days ago. As she left she said, "Nice yellow rat snake." "Yes!" I thought. None of us will be taken to the ER, at least not from this snake.
About then the snake, without the benefit of Mark's attention, uncoiled and started to slither. I guessed it was a climber. "You're right, You're right!" Mark, who talks as if he's in the middle of an emergency situation at all times and not handling it too well, calm as he was with the snake, sort of. The snake climbed the small palm and started up the oak tree. "Take a picture." Mark nearly shouted at me. Dutifully, I took a photo and a few more for good measure.
Mark gave me his e-mail address when I pulled out pen, paper. "Just like my wife." he said. "She carries everything with her." Turns out he lives in Newburyport, MA. He was married in Hellcamp Swamp on Plum Island where I've done a lot of birding over the years. He's a landscaper with 3/4 of an acre and a small white house he bought a year or two ago. "I waited until I knew I could afford it." He's built a huge butterfly garden everyone is amazed at, besides planting a list of plants he rattled off that didn't even sound vaguely familiar. "I love nature" Mark, picked up his snorkle stuff, his white plastic bag that was going to hold the snake while he transported it over to a more snake-friendly environment and headed for the beach where his wife was probably beginning to wonder what had happened to him. "You made my day," he shouted over his shoulder. I smiled and took one last photo of the snake sprawled across the branches of an overhanging tree, out of sight of beach goers.
Gotta go. Gotta pack. FAN
If I remember correctly, pigmy rattlers are deadly. They are quite small; your snake was too large to be one. When you said "cutting this short," where you referring to the blog? :)
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