Jailed Lizard

This lizard, God knows how, ended up trapped between the layers of screen on the porch door's lower half, layers reinforced over time as dogs and squirrels clawed the screen and tore it, inspiring the stapling on of new and stronger barriers. And for several days the lizard hung there, unmoving. It was there so long I thought it must have died with nothing to eat and no water. But in case it needed water, I did trickle some water over the lizard. It stayed as it was.

Surely it is dead, I said to myself, and resigned myself to watching its body dehydrate whenever I sat on the porch.

Then one day -- a full week later -- it had changed position. Could it still be alive?

Consider the lizard, equipped for dry and difficult conditions. It stands to reason that of course it was still alive! But it had no way out.

I pried off a patch of screen about an inch square and attempted to prod the lizard toward it. It reacted, but wouldn't go.

I bet, I said to myself, if I leave it alone it will find its way out after serving eight days in prison. And so it was, the same day.

We Finally Met

On an early-evening walk up the lane I chanced to look where I was going for once, and thank God I did because a copperhead snake about 18 inches long (adults measure 24 to 36 inches), lay in my path where it hadn't been just minutes before, and I gave it lots of space -- after greeting it very politely by its Latin name: Agkistrodon contortrix phaeogaster Gloyd, and taking a photo so you'd believe me. This is the third species of venomous snake I've met on the property and the second I've photographed. The day I met the Timber Rattler, around 2001, I was weed-whacking near the creek when I heard a curious noise -- a rattle -- and saw a black-patterned snake as thick as my arm letting me know I was intruding, and that day I weed-whacked no more. I met a Pygmy Rattlesnake on my doorstep last year. Watch where you're walking at dusk. A Missouri man died of a copperhead's bite this past July but he'd actually picked it up to show it to his son. The last Missouri death by copperhead before that was in 1965.

A Rattler at My Door

At dusk I fetched my mail, and when opening the screen door to get back into the house nearly stepped on a young snake right on the concrete threshold. (Between door and threshhold is a gap of half an inch). "Oh!" I cried. "Excuse me!" It stayed put and I saw this was not offspring of my house blacksnake, or a garter or milk snake. It stayed in striking position, head raised, the entire time, so I used the zoom feature to get closer, but then the photos turned grainy. I kept shooting while its tail -- very thin at the tip -- vibrated like a needle of a gauge that has reached its upper limit, and knew it was a rattler. So when it finally struck out I backed away and shut the screen door carefully so as not to pinch it and annoy it further, and hoped it would then travel away from the house rather than come in. I don't fear snakes--I respect them--but this was my first photo session in the house with a venomous snake, a Pygmy Rattler (Sistrurus miliarius streckeri Gloyd --try to say THAT after three beers). No one is known to have died from a Pygmy Rattler bite, says the fine manual The Amphibians and Reptiles of Missouri. That manual says it's a southern Missouri snake and it is not recorded to have appeared in Jefferson County, but I'm tellin' ya, it was here. This was a baby 5 or 6 inches long. I hope it doesn't go summon its 20-inch mom and bring her back to scold me.

These Skinks Had Better Learn

Looking up from my work I saw a skink climbing a screen on the porch. At first I couldn't tell if the skink was inside or outside. If it's inside, it's an emergency--for the skink. Often these lizards can find their ways indoors, but I've had a few visiting skinks who seemed unable to find their ways out and required my assistance.

This skink was inside looking out. Of course it shied when I approached, and tried to flee, but could only crawl madly across and around the edges of the screen, so close to but so far from the great green universe it wanted to escape to. And here came this gigantic hairy bag of salt water hundreds of times larger than the skink. I knew I looked to it like a monster, and spoke kindly to it, unhooking the screen on both sides and laying it down so it made a nice ramp to the outdoors. Still the skink clung to the screen. I tapped the screen. I shook the frame a little. No dice. I said, like my mother, "In or out. One or the other. Make up your mind. I don't have all day." This did it. It scrambled off.

These skinks have to understand that I run a tight ship here with no room for slackers or nervous Nellys.

Rock 'n' Roll Reptile

A special guest star joined the army worms aka tent caterpillars in my dining room last night: a young blacksnake. His mom lives beneath the kitchen floorboards and is as thick as my wrist. Already crazed by the hundreds of crawling things in my house, I approached him with a camera hoping he'd dine for me on nearby caterpillars. He gave me a full-on, like totally natural, snake dance.

"Will You Please Help Me?"

"If it's smart enough to find its way in, it's smart enough to find its way out," Demetrius used to yawn, whenever skinks, lizards, snakes and whatnot got into the house. But maybe not. The Broad-Headed Skink that crawled from beneath the dishwasher last month (see April 18th) lived here about 10 days. One afternoon I came home after a day out, and it was in the middle of the kitchen floor clearly waiting for me, and it looked up into my face with an expression that quite plainly said, "I want out. Will you please help me?"

"I will help you," I replied, and opened the porch door and tried luring it out there, but it would not go. (Yes indeed, this skink is missing part of its tail; it was that way when we met. Maybe that's why it was skittish.) Then taking the broom I very gently swept it, an inch at a time, over the threshhold and out onto the porch, and then out the screen door onto the concrete stoop, where for a moment it regarded the wide world it was about to rejoin. This let me take the photo. When the camera got too close, the skink ran away through the grass, to some secret lair where I hope it's much happier. Probably it now makes the rounds on skink talk shows, describing its ordeal among the aliens, and how it survived because God had a special purpose for its life, and so on.

Hello, Southern Coal Skink

While I was cutting patches for the porch screens about noon, a rustling next to the pump house made me think, "It's the blacksnake." But the resident blacksnake is usually noiseless. More rustling. I went to look. Saw something unusual, cumin-colored, fat and glossy. I thought, "The glass lizard," but when I went outside with the camera and knelt by the ivy that covers fallen oak leaves, I saw its face and little alligator legs. What intelligent eyes. I said, "Hello."

When I moved too close it backed up beneath the ivy so that only its tail showed. I said, "I can still see you." The Amphibians and Reptiles of Missouri by Tom R. Johnson, the only handbook ever needed around here, ID'd it as Southern Coal Skink, plump body, stubby legs and all. Latin: Eumeces anthracinus pluvialis Cope. This is a female. The male has orange patches on its cheeks because it doesn't know how to blend foundation.