WHIG-STANDARD (Kingston, Ontario) 12 March 05 Feeling snaky over losing our reptiles: Eastern Hog-nosed Snakes like this area and may be making your garden their home but their numbers are dwindling (Mary Anne Beaudette)
The approach of March 17 had me thinking about the legend of St. Patrick, in which the good saint was said to have rid Ireland of all of its snakes.
The idea of a country without snakes intrigues me. It's hard to imagine an ecosystem without these sinuous, slithery creatures. I like snakes. They're harmless, quiet, and don't eat my plants or raid the birdfeeder. There's a quality of elegance about their lean shape and subtle colouring. I've always thought a snake would look good in a tuxedo.
I've had a number of unexpected, up-close moments with snakes in the garden, and I always feel fortunate that I wasn't born with a snake phobia.
(Spiders are another matter. I wouldn't be caught anywhere near my garden if I had reason to believe a spider the size of a snake was lurking in there.)
Comparing notes with people, I've learned that snake encounters aren't uncommon.
I've had to fish the odd garter snake out of my rain barrel and window wells (what were they thinking?), and someone I know had the pleasure of observing a snake hatchery in his garden shed.
My most memorable snake moment was last summer. It was one of the few hot, sunny days of the year and I decided to take a walk around the perimeter of the yard and check things out. I was scuffing along between the end of one of the perennial borders and the dense, scrubby thicket that marks the border of our yard when my foot stopped in mid-air. By the time it touched down, the biggest snake I'd ever seen was sliding between my feet and into the thicket. It was big enough that it took several seconds to move its length across my vision from left to right, and a good 15 to 20 centimetres of its tail stuck out of the thicket when it decided to rest.
I stood still, watching it for several minutes, then tiptoed out of the yard to tell the family about my find. I tried to memorize its colouring - brown and yellow, with regular markings along what little of its body I could see. By the time I returned, the snake had vanished. Every sunny day after that I crept up on that spot but my reptilian visitor never returned.
My neighbours mentioned that they'd had an Eastern Hog-nosed snake on their property some years ago, so I wondered whether this was what I had seen. I went looking for a useful snake identification book and came across the Royal Ontario Museum's Field Guide to Amphibians and Reptiles in Ontario ($24.99, paperback). The photo in this handy guide tells me that it probably was.
I've since learned that Hog-nosed snakes get their name from their upturned nose, and they can grow up to a metre and a half in length. They eat mostly toads and frogs, and they have a curious habit of turning belly-up and playing dead when they're cornered by a predator. They'll continue the charade even if picked up - how's that for acting skills?
Hog-nosed snakes like sandy soil, thinly wooded uplands, hillsides, cultivated fields and woodland meadows, and are found usually near water, or places with lots of amphibians - all of which we have nearby. Abandoned farmsteads or rutted tracks are also favoured because they provide cool, damp places for water (and prey).
Like all snakes, they hibernate in winter in exposed bedrock, stone walls or other rocky places. (And lord knows we have an abundance of those around here.) It wouldn't surprise me if my garden guest had bunked down somewhere nearby, because there's a wealth of rockpiles around.
I was surprised to learn that Hog-nosed snakes aren't that common to this area, and disturbed to find out that they're on the threatened list of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada. This means that unless conditions change, they're headed for extinction. Possible reasons for their decline include loss of habitat, too few connecting corridors - mine slid into a corridor when I disturbed it - too little food, and competition from other snakes.
This information gave me a new perspective on last summer's soggy weather. Humans hated it, but it must have been a huge respite for the local reptile and amphibian populations.
I'm going to be keeping my eyes on the ground this summer in the hopes that I'll be rewarded with another glimpse of this lovely creature. In the meantime, I'm grateful that Canada was spared Ireland's fate.