Our Sweet and Crazy Coonhound ...

Our Sweet and Crazy Coonhound ...
Run Free: birthdate unknown - Oct. 17 2008

Friday, June 27, 2008

Snake with a collar

Can you find the snake in this picture?

We saw this tiny little guy on the sidewalk at the dog park. At first H-Mom thought it was a crazy earthworm. It was writhing around like an insane nightcrawler on a hot sidewalk. Then it got its bearings (some dog must have disrupted it from the lawn) and wiggled with that distinctive s-winding snake motion back to the grass and leaves. It was very, very petite and only about 6 inches long from head to tail. The body was shiny black with a brilliant, thread-thin yellow ring -- like a bright sunshine-colored dog collar -- around its neck. H-Mom likes to GOOGLE everything she discovers. Now we know that this tiny snake was a southern ringneck.


from Florida Conservation on the Web: ... the most abundant snakes in Florida are seldom more than 12-14 inches long. Although common in most gardens and backyards, these diminutive snake species are easily overlooked due to their secretive habits.

A good representative is the southern ringneck snake, a distinctive little snake that is shiny black or dark gray above, with a bright orange or yellow neck ring. The belly is a startlingly bright orange or yellow with a row of black half-moons down the center. Ringnecks spend most of their lives under mulch or leaf litter, where they feed on small lizards, earthworms, slugs and salamanders. They are fairly social and often are found in groups of two or three.

The ringneck is one of the least aggressive animals in the world and almost never attempts to bite people. Even if it should try to bite, its mouth and teeth are too small to cause a wound. When seriously threatened, ringnecks defend themselves by thrashing about and expelling musk. The four to seven eggs laid in midsummer hatch 40-50 days later into tiny snakelings, only 4 inches long!

11 comments:

River said...

My mom's mom in Va. has those little snakes in her garden wall. I didn't know about the musk part. Need to stick my nose in the wall sometime.

love & wags,
River

Steve, Kat, & Wilbur said...

We will not show this post to our mom. She freaks at the sight of a snake... even in pictures.

Steve and Kat

Toffee said...

EEEEK! Snakes!!....(the sound of Toffee running under covers)...

Joe Stains said...

we think snakes are pretty cool, Mom used to have some when she was younger!

Molly the Airedale said...

Our mom HATES snakes! She says they're evil to the core!

Love ya lots,
Maggie and Mitch

Patience-please said...

Howdy, Walker!!! Hey some day we'll have to tell the story about Loosey the coonhound that came and stayed with us til she found her forever home. Your face reminded us soooo much of her!
Any how, thanks for visiting! we've added you to our bloglines, so we're looking forward to getting to know you.

wags from the whippets

Biggie-Z said...

That's so sad! The ringneck defends itself by ... FARTING!

Booker, what did you think of it? Did you pounce on it? Pee on it?

Unknown said...

hahaha we told Man-Dad that my new nickname is P-Man. He thought it was pretty funny. I didn't even SEE the wriggly snake. I think I was peeing on a tree or something important like that!

BrandytheGreat said...

Eek. Never met a snake and never would like to!

Kess And Her Mama said...

Hmm..Another new fact to add to our lil' nuggets of info. Thanks Booker's mum

Charity, Katie, Louie & Natalie said...

I enjoyed the snake lesson...very interesting.