For the second time this year, I encountered a snake in my backyard Wednesday afternoon. It could easily have been the same snake. The pic. above is not my snake. It’s a good look-alike that I found on the Oakland County blog. Searching for Michigan snakes, this is about the closest pic. that I could find, though my snaked looked a little more tan and a little less gray.
The first time I saw a snake this year, it was mid-summer. The snake was just past the steps leading from our back porch door. I was on the phone and saw it out the porch window. I called my wife and she kind of freaked out. It looked pretty harmless to me.
This was no small snake, it was at least 3 feet long. I figured it was living under my porch. Wednesday, I was mowing the lawn and I saw it moving quickly away from the mower about 8 feet in front of me. It was pretty agile, quickly moving under my fence and into my neighbor’s yard and from there down to the back of his yard, where there is a wooded drop off about 10 feet wide before the next yard begins.
On the other side of my next-door neighbor, that house has chickens and at least one duck. I figured the snake was too small to go after a chicken, but it dawned on my that I haven’t seen a chipmunk in a month and we had quite a few of them earlier this year. We also have a rabbit living in the yard.
Oh, – and one time the rabbit got caught in my garage. I opened the door (to the house) in the AM and there was the rabbit…which hopped slowly under a car. I opened the garage door and it moved back out into the yard. I’ve seen the rabbit before and it was bold enough to hop to around 15 feet of me.
Our cat has been asking to go on the front porch at night, so I assume there’ s a critter that he’s checking on. In the past we’ve had the rare raccoon, possum or even another stray cat pass by at night.
I’ll keep you posted if I see the snake again.
