Four days ago I went out in the morning to discover that a pile of split and stacked wood had fallen. “Ah well, I’ll just have to try again and do a better job of keeping things level or tilted back toward the slope.”
The next evening one of the cats found a black snake under some of the fallen wood–at the edge of the pile. I rescued the snake by putting the cat back in the house. Each time we’ve gone outside since then, I’ve seen the black snake in the same place. I didn’t think too much of it because that snake had been moving around and fussing at the cat each time she investigated it.
Today I finally re-stacked the wood. In the process, I encouraged the snake to go back to a safe place in the pile of wood. At first, it turned its body round to keep facing me no matter which way I approached it. A couple times it lunged toward me. Definitely intimidating. . . Anyway, I gently pushed (with gloved hand holding a small piece of wood) against the snake who immediately dashed for a space under the freshly stacked wood pile which was slightly elevated off the ground.
When I processed the photos later, I realized the snake had been injured. There is a mark of blood on the piece of wood to the left of the snake. I looked back through the previous days’ photos and found one I took the first night which shows the back portion of the snake’s body . . . AND that it was pinned under a piece of wood.
I felt really bad when I realized the snake had been caught under the wood for at least four days. However, I guess I can be grateful I did rescue it (finally) and I am hoping it can recover completely from this experience and get some food for itself. I know there are lots of lizards hanging around that wood pile.
