Stories From The Pack

Stories From The Pack

Snaky In The Back Yard

By Shelley Peterson

It was a beautiful summer afternoon and my dogs and I took the opportunity to relax in the shade of a couple trees in our spacious back yard. There was the soft whisper of a breeze gently rustling the leaves of the trees as the birds sang in the distance. I was relaxing in my lounge chair reading a good book and sipping an ice-cold drink enjoying the afternoon. The dogs were scattered all around the yard, stretched out and snoozing. All was tranquil and right in our little world that afternoon. Or so I thought.

Unfortunately, our tranquility was not about to last. You know how when someone is staring at you, and you can feel them staring even if you can’t see them at first? I noticed that feeling while I was reading and looked up to find Shadow and Sawshaw sitting side by side, staring and whining at me. There is nothing more annoying than a dog staring at you and whining at you while you’re in the middle of a good book, never mind two of them doing it.

“Go lay down,” I told them while pointing to the ground. They didn’t move, they just continued to whine and stare at me. “Ok,” I thought, “This is starting to get annoying.” So I tried to make them lay down again, and again, and again. Now I’m starting to get a little more than annoyed.

Finally, I yell at them to lay down. Shadow reluctantly laid down close to me but Sawshaw refused and continued with the staring and whining. I did notice one thing different this time, she kept looking just passed the picnic table and then back to me. “Oh, I get it,” I thought, “the hissing noise she was hearing was just the sprinkler hose leaking a little.” I told her to go lay down one last time. Then I just tried to ignore her. That didn’t work.

I was so frustrated I finally got out of my nice comfy lounge chair and said, “Fine! I’m sure it’s just the hose leaking but let’s go check it out.” So, with Sawshaw beside me, behaving very nervously, we went to find the source the of the hissing hose. Shadow chose to remain close to my chair and let us do the investigating.

The sprinkler was on in the front yard and the hose was attached to the faucet in the back yard. We began following the hose from the back of the house to the front gate looking for signs of it leaking. That is when I heard it, the sound of something hissing. I realized the hissing noise was not coming from the hose but from the other side of the picnic table where there was no hose.

“Interesting,” I thought. “Let’s go check it out Sawshaw.” Sawshaw whined at me looking from me to the other side of the picnic table and appearing quite nervous about what was over there. I slowly approach trying to see what it was that Sawshaw and Shadow had been trying to tell me about. Then I see it and stop dead in my tracks. “No way!” I exclaim to myself, “This can’t be real.” But, sure enough, it was very real.

What my dogs had been trying to warn me about was a big, beautiful rattle snake sunning itself in my back yard. This is what had been on the other side of the picnic table and a not so far behind me when I was in my lounge chair. I didn’t really notice the rattling of his tail until I saw it coiled up in the sunshine on one of my sidewalk blocks. That’s when I heard the rattling. I think it was the coolest thing I have ever had the privilege of encountering in my back yard. Needless to say; I had an abundance of adrenalin coursing through my body at this point. It was exhilarating!

My next thought was, “I have to get my camera and get a picture of this. No one’s going to believe this.” I called Shadow and Sawshaw to me and took them inside. I rushed to get my camera and get a picture before the rattle snake disappeared. On my out the door I hollered out to my husband, “Mark! Come quick! There’s a rattle snake in the back yard! Hurry!” I had to yell for him a couple more times before getting his attention. Then I was out the door and back to the rattle snake trying to figure out how I was going to get close enough to get a good picture of it.

As I began taking photos I gradually started getting a little closer and a little closer still. I wasn’t thinking about it striking me I just wanted that one good picture. It was at this point that Mark came outside and became concerned at how close I had gotten to this rattle snake. He quietly informed me that I was within striking distance of this amazing creature and that he was poised to strike. I heeded his warning and slowly backed away from the rattle snake. I had captured the photo I had been looking for by this time. I acquired a proper zoom lens soon after this experience.

With the photo session out of the way we were able to capture the snake in a five gallon pail and put a square pane of glass over it so we could safely get a closer look at it. As I was looking at it with my face close to the glass, the rattle snake struck the glass with such force you could hear the thud. Scared the crap out of me!

My husband ended up taking the rattle snake down to the river where we thought it had come from. There's a rattle snake nesting area near the river. Mark released him back into his natural habitat and went on his way.

There are two lessons I learned from this experience. 1) You just might want to get out of your lounge chair and check things out when your dogs are insistently trying to tell you something and 2) Don’t mess with rattle snakes if you don’t have to. I was lucky I didn’t get bit during this experience. But, that would make a cool story too.