Bessie and the snake

It’s springtime and warmer weather means snakes. I read somewhere that Mississippi has over 50 different species of snakes. Snake-lovers say there are good snakes and bad snakes, and, they keep the rodent population down. Probably, if it weren’t for these slithering varmints, we’d be up to our hip-boots in rats.
This may be the case, but I still can’t find it in my heart to make friends with a snake. To me, s-n-a-k-e is a four-letter word. And, I mean a big, bad four-letter word.
It is the time of year for these scaly creatures to slither around the yard, in outdoor sheds, and in flower gardens. For some reason, these vipers visit my neck-of-the-woods first go ‘round.
I’ve already encountered three snakeroos this season. The first was earlier in the spring. I was getting some saved spring flowers to take to the cemetery from the collection I have stored in my shed. I am a bit of a pack-rat. And, maybe I make it easy for snakes to hang around the old home place. But, what’s the alternative? Clean up the shed? Probably not gonna happen, I might need some of that stuff sometime.
Anyway, back to the snakes. The second encounter was . . . well, it wasn’t really with the snake. It was with his skin. This fella crawled into my shed weaved in and out of the two-by-four studs leaving his scaly skin along the way. Now, I don’t know whether snake skins stretch as their bodies slither along leaving them behind or not. This skin was six or eight feet long. And, if it is all the same, I had just as soon not meet the reptile that decided to exfoliate in my shed.
My third encounter was a bit more on the hysterical side. Hysterically funny for me, and hysterically frightening for Bessie.
Bessie is a friend who is notoriously humorous in her own right, but throw in a snake and funny doesn’t even begin to describe the scene.
Bessie has a garden pond that has become over run with pond scum. The fish won’t even live here. But, a bad ol’ cottonmouth moved in and set up housekeeping.
Bessie has a habit of leaving her shoes on the porch. The other day, she slipped on her sandal, only to find something in the shoe besides her foot. She kicked it off. Figuring it was just a little ol’ frog. She picked it up and peeked inside, as she was peeking in, a small cottonmouth was peeking back. Eyeball to eyeball.
She threw the shoe down, ran in side the house and locked the door behind her. Once inside, she discovered her puppy was still outside. Slinging open the door, she grabbed the dog, and darted in again.
Frantic, she called her son. No answer.
She called her brother. No answer.
Just short of calling 911, she spotted a neighbor pulling into his driveway. Out the front door she bolted. Flagging him down she explained the situation.
“Calm down Bessie,” he said. “I’ll get a hoe and be on my way.”
“Forget it,” she screamed. “I got one.”
When the dynamic duo returned to the scene of the snake-in-the-shoe, the snake had decided to take a stand. He was still in the shoe looking out the open toe.
With a few wacks of the hoe, the snake was on his way to snake heaven. And, Bessie’s sandal looked like the puppy had used it for teething.
Someone told me that snakes didn’t want to be around me anymore than I wanted to be around them. Now, I find that hard to believe, since they are always coming into my territory. I have found them in my shed, my garage, my yard, my wood-pile, and even my house. I don’t go looking for them.
This country girl may be from the country, but she has no desire to come face to face with another snake. And, I bet Bessie feels the same way.
There may be help. There’s a product called Snake Guard. It is a snake trap, kind of like the roach motel. The snake crawls into this little disguised glue sheet and gets stuck. Getting rid of the stuck snake can be another matter.
With the luck I’ve been having in My Corner of the World, the stuck snake would simply decided to shed his skin and move on. Forget the snake motel. Give me a hoe or shotgun. I’ll reserve that slithering serpent a place on Boot Hill.