Arizona Wildlife......

The other day Brooke and I purchased some new flowering shrubs for the yard.  Yesterday I planted and watered them.  This will be the ritual for the next week or two, so that they may get enough water to root.  I make my rounds out front, come into the backyard and begin to do the same.  My trusty companion Rylee, always at my side, is keeping me company.  She follows me from plant to plant.  I begin to fill one of the wells up with water and I notice that the emitter is off of the sprinkler lines for the automatic sprinklers.  I set the bucket down and sit on the rocks to the right of the shrub and begin to clean it off and attach it back to the drip line.

That's when Rylee springs into the air about a good foot off of the rocks.  She immediately gets into "attack mode"or a "what the hell is that thing?" mode.  I look over just a foot away from to where she just  was..........and then I see it.   Bands of black and white, wrapped around a 24-30" body.  

Do you see it?   Oh yeah!   A King snake.   I almost sat on the damn thing.   After Rylee jumped and pointed at it, she started to go after it again.  It coiled itself up against the tree and started hissing and making a "rattling" noise with it's head.  I've never seen that happen before.  I restrained Rylee and checked her for any bite marks.

There are many poisonous and non-poisonous snakes here in Arizona, but I forgot what the colors and marking are,  I called my neighbors "up-stairs" to find out which ones are which, while I kept the girls at bay.  Luckily,  it's only a King snake which are non-poisonous and are great to have around the yard.  They kill rodents,  small creatures and other snakes. They are part of the Constrictor family of snakes and are immune to the venom of Rattlesnakes and will often eat them as well.

Once I had the girls safely inside, I tried to wrangled the reptile.  It was hiding under some weed fabric and rip-rap rocks.  I emptied the bucket of water into the shrub and used that to transport it into the front yard.  It was very quick, it was dodging and weaving in and out of the rocks.  After a couple of failed attempts,  I got it to stay in the bucket as I walked it out front for the realease.

And there it goes.   It was trying to figure out it's surroundings and which way to go.  I kind of directed it over to the rocks and shrubs in the front for some protection from the owls and coyotes that wander through the neighborhood.

It's a good thing that Brooke was NOT here.  You've heard of  "the shot heard around the world" right.  Well, it would've been "the scream heard around the world" instead.