Snake Magnet?

Last week, I took this shot of a 3 foot gopher snake. I also got a nice video of it, plus another smaller gopher snake and a ring-necked snake while out on my hike. All in all, I ended up seeing 4 snakes that day and because I've encountered other snakes in the past couple of weeks, I've been dubbed the snake magnet and several people had indicated that they don't want to hike with me because I attract snakes.

Now a little background is probably in order here. I've always been fascinated by snakes and wanted to have one as a pet when I was younger, but because my mother was deathly afraid of snakes, I never could. While teaching, a teaching friend of mine offered up his daughter's snake to me. She had gone off to college and he didn't want to take care of it, so he gave it to me for my science classroom. It was a beautiful corn snake that I had for about 10 years.

Now I encounter snakes in the wild, probably because during warmer months, I ALWAYS scan 10 to 15 feet ahead on the trail. I don't want to step on one, so I think I'm possibly more observant than the average hiker. And here's something else to think about. If you see lizards on the trail, there are snakes active as well, you just haven't discovered them yet. So the question is, would you rather hike with someone who is observant of snakes and spots them from 10 feet off, or would you rather encounter a snake from 10 inches? The choice is yours, but I'm always willing to hike with you.

And then there were 6

Here's a quick update on our bird situation. Yesterday and today were quite dreary and we got over a tenth of an inch of rain today. I hadn't seen any activity in a couple of days, so I decided to check on the nest. Definitely signs of activity as the nest is more feather-lined, but the most important evidence of activity is the number of eggs. Now, instead of the three that I noted on April 7th, there are 6 individual little eggs. With 14 to 16 day incubation periods, these little guys, if they've been taken care of by their parents correctly should begin hatching in a couple of days.

I will be monitoring, from afar, the progress over the next couple of days. Here's hoping the weather starts to warm up, but we have a 30 to 40% chance of some more rain on Monday, so these little ones are going to be in for a chilly first couple of days of life.

14 months

14 months ago today, I got a haircut, not realizing at the time that it would be the last time I'd gotten a haircut. To say it's starting to bug me is a bit of an understatement. And I know eventually I'll get it cut again, as it's so much easier to deal with when it's short. But for the moment, it grows, and grows, and grows.

To be honest, I never thought that the longest my hair would ever be was in my 60s. I figured my "long-haired hippie" days were far behind me, yet here I am, still embracing the shaggy.

And no, it's not really that lopsided. The wind was blowing making it pouf out on one side and flattening it down on the other. Yeah, that's my story and I'm sticking with it. So anyway, I thought I'd let you see what 14 months look like and since I'm not fully vaccinated until after I reach 15 months without a haircut, it will be a little longer before it eventually gets cut.

Birds in the Breezeway

About two weeks ago I noticed a bird flitting around in the breezeway between our garage and the main part of our house. Now, there's all sorts of stuff in the breezeway, mostly geocaching stuff, but there's also several containers, boxes, buckets and baskets. This bird, or actually these two birds kept flying in and out of the breezeway and eventually I figured out they were building a nest somewhere in the breezeway. By just sitting there, I also eventually figured out they were building the nest in the wicker basket. The lid to the white plastic bucket in the photo had been casually thrown into the wicker basket and it created a void underneath, with an opening about the size of a small bird, but not large enough for most predators. It was really a perfect place for them to set up housekeeping.

And of course, because I'm me, I had to see what the nest looked like and so I carefully lifted the plastic lid. Immediately, the bird that was sitting on the nest flew off leaving behind a perfectly empty nest. So, they were still in the process of building their home and hadn't settled down to family life yet. I carefully put the plastic lid back down and hoped that I hadn't scared them off from their nest. 

Fortunately, I spotted one of them the next day with more nest building materials, so I knew that their home was still being built and I hadn't scared them off. I'm pretty sure, based on everything that I've researched, that I have a pair of Bewick's Wrens nesting in that wicker basket. For a timeline, the first photo was taken March 27th and the second photo was taken on April 7th.

A couple of days went by and I stopped seeing the birds, so I was worried that they may have abandoned the nest, so I gingerly checked it again. No birds were in the nest, however, as the photo indicates, there were three little eggs now residing there, which meant that momma and papa were probably close by. As you can see by the first photo, they really did pick a choice location, as the spot gets a lot of warmth from the afternoon sun, which means they don't have to spend all their time sitting on the nest. I'm not sure of this particular bird's nesting habits, but I know other birds routinely leave their nests, so it's kind of nice that they're going to be naturally heated while the parents are away.

Last night, April 8th, I was sitting out in the breezeway talking with a friend of mine on the phone and I heard animal rustlings. This, in itself is not surprising, because we have quite a number of different kinds of animals that have come through our back yard from time to time, from squirrels and lizards, to possums, skunks and raccoons, not to mention a flurry of different kinds of birds. So naturally, I looked to my right to see what was making the noise and one of the wrens was sitting on the edge of a plastic bucket about two feet from where its mate was probably sitting on the nest, so I definitely know they're actively taking care of the eggs now too. 

For scale in your own mind, the cup of the nest is about 2.5 inches in diameter with an overall diameter of the nest on the order of about 5 to 6 inches. Although the photo doesn't show it very well, there are three eggs in there and who knows if they've laid some more after that photo was taken a couple of days ago. Incubation for the eggs is roughly 14-16 days, which means they could begin hatching as early as this upcoming Tuesday or as late as the 21st of April. Needless to say, I'll be keeping you posted as we await the chirping of little ones coming from the interior of that wicker basket.

Now I need to dig out the large bird feeder and fill it with some appropriate seed for the parents to use. And I also think that if everything had been put away correctly, they'd be nesting someplace else, so I guess it sometimes pays to be a little bit messy or disorganized.