Sunday, March 12, 2006
Function Follows Form...
This is the first post of my blog. As usual, I don't have much to say, but if I want to tweak the layout, I have to have at least one post up.
So this is it.
But rather than just leave this a filler post, let me give a shout out to my favorite snake, Nerodia sipedon. The Northern Water Snake comes in 31 flavors of coloration, but where I'm from (upstate NY), it's usually covered with latitudinal stripes or blotches of brown, tan or gray. As they get older and larger, the coloration often darkens, so that the striping is completely obscured. Down south, there's a whole passel of snakes that look kind of similar, but up north, if you see a something snakey that's close to water, has keeled scales and doesn't look like a viper, then it's probably Mr. sipedon.
They're also noted for their general ill disposition. While these fellows aren't dangerous to humans, their salivia is chock full of anticoagulents and they bite and snap like rabid schnauzers when picked up. Also (like many snakes), they'll shit all over you (like many babies).
My love affair with this lovely serpent began when I was in college. I spent a summer working as a field hand in an ecology project (run by this fellow) and during my copious free time I would spend a lot of time at Six Mile Creek. It was very dry that summer and the stream had largely stopped flowing; instead the creekbed was dotted with puddles full of trapped minnows. I would walk up the dry bed to the dam at the top of the park and at every puddle I'd stop and scan the surface. Sometimes there'd be a water snake sunning itself on a nearby rock, sometimes there would be one rapidly disappearing into a hiding place, and sometimes, there'd be nothing at all. And then I'd wait a few minutes, watching the fish dart back and forth, until one got a little too close to a particularly large rock on the bottom and a cloud of detritus and blood exploded, following a strike too fast for the eye to track.
So this is it.
But rather than just leave this a filler post, let me give a shout out to my favorite snake, Nerodia sipedon. The Northern Water Snake comes in 31 flavors of coloration, but where I'm from (upstate NY), it's usually covered with latitudinal stripes or blotches of brown, tan or gray. As they get older and larger, the coloration often darkens, so that the striping is completely obscured. Down south, there's a whole passel of snakes that look kind of similar, but up north, if you see a something snakey that's close to water, has keeled scales and doesn't look like a viper, then it's probably Mr. sipedon.
They're also noted for their general ill disposition. While these fellows aren't dangerous to humans, their salivia is chock full of anticoagulents and they bite and snap like rabid schnauzers when picked up. Also (like many snakes), they'll shit all over you (like many babies).
My love affair with this lovely serpent began when I was in college. I spent a summer working as a field hand in an ecology project (run by this fellow) and during my copious free time I would spend a lot of time at Six Mile Creek. It was very dry that summer and the stream had largely stopped flowing; instead the creekbed was dotted with puddles full of trapped minnows. I would walk up the dry bed to the dam at the top of the park and at every puddle I'd stop and scan the surface. Sometimes there'd be a water snake sunning itself on a nearby rock, sometimes there would be one rapidly disappearing into a hiding place, and sometimes, there'd be nothing at all. And then I'd wait a few minutes, watching the fish dart back and forth, until one got a little too close to a particularly large rock on the bottom and a cloud of detritus and blood exploded, following a strike too fast for the eye to track.
// posted by nerodia @ 2:19 PM 
