Snaking around my house

Shudder.

A few weeks' back, Robert filmed lovely video footage of a black ratsnake winding its way through one of our hanging flower baskets on our front porch. I was so creeped out that I couldn't even watch the whole thing. As if I'll ever look at the flower baskets the same way again. . .

Well, our snake friend; he's back.

Robert knows its the same one. Blacky (as my husband has affectionately been calling him) has a battle scar across one eye which appears to be blind. I should find a little bit of comfort in that, but I don't. I also don't find any comfort in knowing that this snake is all to comfortable making his way up onto my back deck.



To make me even more wary, that link I posted up there tells me that black ratsnake eggs are expected to hatch in August or September. What if our snake is female?



Rob tries to convince me that black ratsnakes are good, eating unwanted rodents that might otherwise hang around the house. That would be good--but I've never seen any mice or rats or anything like that. And I refuse to consider that the snake might be doing its job.

I would like Blacky a little better, just maybe, if he ate squirrels. But he's not quite that big.



And if I come across him unexpectedly and drop dead of a heart attack, that doesn't make him too good either. And it's also not good that now I can worry about little snake babies.

Shudder.