monsoon 2014; hanging on for dear life

 I'm sitting here writing this as rain has been falling for several hours this morning. It has reminded me that I never finished the monsoon series. I'm sure that the number one question on your mind while reading about all this rain is..."Norma... where do you think all the animals go when it floods like it did?" If you haven't thought about it... you should...it really is an interesting question.

I happened to stumble across the answer to the question for one particular creature. The day it was pouring like crazy and I was back in forth between my neighbors flooded patio and the rising water in our backyard, as I noticed a little something out of the corner of my eye. I'm getting good at noticing things with the corners of my eyes.

Side note: The other night I carried an armload of dark laundry to the laundry room to do a quick load of dark clothes. All was well and the washer was running smoothly as I started dinner. All was cooking smoothly as I decided to run to our bedroom. As I passed through the dining room into the front hall...out of the corner of my eye I see a long dark snakelike thing in the dark hallway. Instinct has taught me to jump well out of the way while shouting a little SCREAM!  Reptile Wrangler called from the kitchen  "What?" His confusion was written all over his face as I began to laugh hysterically while pointing to the floor. "Look, in the dark over there...I thought it was a snake! But, it's not!"  He shook his head as he picked up one of his long, dark, scary.black.socks that I must have dropped from my armload of clothes. Yes, I can laugh at myself. Yes, I can be ok with screaming. Do ya blame me?

Ok...so back to the flooding and the big question...where do the creatures go?

Remember the big wash down at the bottom of our hill?

As I was walking by the other end of it heading to our neighbor's house, I see a little something out of the corner of my eye. There...can you see it?

A little closer. That is, apparently, what snakes do to get out of the rushing water. They hang on for their lives!

A different view. I couldn't quite tell if it was a mama and her babies (sounds too cute for snake talk) or if it was just several different kinds of snakes. If you look further down from the large one at the top of the green you will see a little orange leaf. To the left of it is another clump of snake.

  I think there were several smaller, more grey colored snakes around the big one, which was very clearly a rattler.

Closer look. Rattle. Head. Coiled body.  Lots of water between it and me. Very long lens on my camera. Reptile Wrangler in Canada. Fascinating. From where I stood...it looked like a big one.

Now we know what the snakes do when it rains. Good to know there was a whole family/community living right there. I wonder where they are now? 

Fascinating.