The Urban Pantheist

First, right up against the back of the house next to our compost, the magic guardian of the compost. Only the bravest and cleverest of mice may get by the guardian. This was the third time I saw it in the course of the day, but the only halfway decent photo. If you follow Alexis on social media you may have seen me holding it--it never tried to bite, it just thoroughly coated me with its stink gland.

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It's hard to believe but this little noodle is a full grown Dekay's brown snake Storeria dekayi. These snakes are some of the most numerous in New England, but because of their size, color, and habits, are rarely seen. People who want to see one should find a big log at the edge of the woods or an old piece of plywood in a vacant lot. Brown snakes are likely to be underneath, hunting for slugs, earthworms, spiders, and other small soft prey.

In April the snakes around Boston wake up and get right to business! Here are two or three common garter snakes Thamnophis sirtalis in a mating cluster along the fence between our yard and driveway. Once discovered they scattered, and I picked one up for posterity.


The saliva of garter snakes is toxic, a form of primitive venom that help incapacitate their prey of earthworms, amphibians, and small mammals. The worst it can do to a human is make us a little itchy. This snake didn't bother, and also didn't make use of its more effective defense, emptying the contents of its cloaca--complete with a powerful scent marking musk. That smell may help snakes communicate with their kind, but on human skin it just communicates a need to wash your hands repeatedly to get rid of the clinging stench.


Garter snakes are gentle creatures, easy prey for cats, dogs, turkeys, and crows in the suburbs. It's possible that their yellow stripes let predators know garters don't taste great--depending on how many toxic amphibians they've eaten. Toad and newt poison can build up in garter snakes, making them one of the few animals that are both poisonous AND venomous.

Our Kenyan sand boa was impossible to see when hiding under the bark mulch substrate. The substrate was changed to sand, and while the snake is still hard to see, you can certainly detect where it has been.


The next exhibit over is the rhino rat snake, posing calmly at the front of the glass.

Zoo Teens with rosy boa and blue-tongued skink.

Alexis cleans the coop.


A friendly face by the back door.


Oh, excuse me! I didn't realize that the nook between the trash and the compost was occupied! Get a room, you two. (They did--we found them in the compost bin later).

Once again I thank you for donating to the Gilmour Fund on my behalf. I'm proud to have gone through it and I'm still laughing at myself for struggling so much. At least there was no lasting damage, and I feel pretty good already. Would you like to see some pictures from the ride?


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Eastern milk snake Lampropeltis triangulum triangulum

It seems calculated to infuriate me, that on the day before a holiday about a mythical purging of snakes (a symbol for the forced conversion of pagans to Christianity), I should find a dead snake in my yard, killed by a predator that couldn't be bothered to eat it. Eastern milk snakes are purportedly quite common in our area, and yet I've personally only encountered one live one, and this dead one. I took care of a couple captive specimens at Drumlin Farm, fairly calm educational animals that eventually died of gout.

Eastern milk snakes are constrictor snakes that prey on mice and other small animals, including other snakes. Sometimes their orange and brown pattern causes the over-cautious to mistake them for copperheads--a venomous species (which enjoys protected status, so don't go chopping them up with your shovel you big bully). Milk snakes are so-called because they were frequently noticed in dairy barns. Hopefully no one actually believed the ludicrous idea they were feeding on milk, since it should be clear that they were feeding on mice in the barns.

Sometimes the dogs will surprise us. Charlie tolerates the puppy but doesn't really like him all that much. We let Charlie into the kitchen (normally puppy-only territory during fostering) and he laid in the puppy's bed. The puppy was not deterred by the bed being full of Charlie, and curled up next to him.

( Now about that wild animal )