Thursday, May 10, 2007

Sssss-cary? Not really.

This morning, I ran into this poor guy just outside of work. It looks like a crow or some other bird tried to get him. Copperheads are not aggressive and rely on camouflage for protection against everything from humans to hawks. He’s lucky it wasn’t my roommate that spotted him, because she told me this horrific story about how her mom found a harmless black snake in their house and she dragged it outside and beat it to death! (Hmm, is it ‘dragged’ or ‘drug’ it outside? Sometimes I hate grammar.) It was one of the few times my roommate and I have not seen eye-to-eye on something. She thought her mother's reaction made perfect sense. I, on the other hand, was appalled. I get hunting. But beating a defenseless animal to death is so disturbing to me that I will never be able to look at her mother the same way. And it’s also why I don’t watch those awful shows on Animal Planet about animal police men and women. I would last all of one day in that job before I would be behind bars for murder.

3 comments:

The [Cherry] Ride said...

Aren't copperheads poisonous? Yikes. I am glad I don;t live in an area where I could be walking to work and run into a snake. Urban sprawl = yay!

Kritkrat said...

Poisonous, yes - but they are not aggressive, so the only way you'd get bit is if you were trying to pick one up or something. They freeze when a predator is around, and they are getting pretty rare in this area now because of that sprawl, which is why I was so excited to see one.

Anonymous said...

i used to own a red tail boa and people would always freak out that i actually *wanted* a snake in my house.

the first question was always "why the fuck do you keep a snake in your house?" followed a close second by "he's not going to get out of that cage is he?"

just to mess with them i'd say something like "well, when he was only 4ft long he didn't have the strength, now he could probably break that door if he wanted to" :)