(Read Article on PawNation)

This somewhat misleading title on PawNation links to a rather interesting article on problems caused by letting exotic pets go into the wild.

This is actually old news.  But it’s a really good picture.

Personally, if I were a kid right now, I’d be excited about the prospect of going out to catch these babies in the wild.  What an awesome snake!

In the green grass
Over by a log
We notice black and white rings
“A kingsnake” says my friend
He bends down to grab
A tail where I see
A rattle

I yank him back
He does not believe
So I carefully handle
Scales rough and beautiful
Holding it eye level
It shows us its fangs
Of venom

From Poetry by Jerry J. Davis

Volunteers in New Haven, Vermont spend long hours at night helping newts, frogs, and salamanders cross the road safely, and are even hoping to arrange construction of little underpasses for creatures to safely pass under the roadway.

This is awesome.

People tend to forget that these are living creatures with lives all their own.  Humans construct these roadways across their homes, and kill hundreds of thousands of them as they’re simply trying to get from one side to the other.  It’s wonderful to know some people out there understand this, and actually care enough to volunteer their time to help these creatures avoid dangers that we, ourselves, have put into their environment.

Bravo, New Haven!

Read the full article here:  Volunteers help salamanders avoid roadway massacre

This 10 foot wild python saw Patty Buntine’s Maltese terrier cross-breed, named Bindi, as food.

As you can tell by the terrier-sized lump in the snake’s tummy.

The dog’s owner is sad but not vindictive.  The snake gets to live, and in fact will be returned to the wild.

You can read the full story here:  Aussie Python Swallows Small Dog

I stumbled across this on Flickr…

Never seen a snake eating a goldfish before, at least not in the wild.

I think it’s a juvenile bull snake.

This toad lives in my friend’s basement, and has lived down there for years.  Sometimes we wonder if it ever gets lonely.

Actually, it’s the organization who runs The Orwell Prize that’s doing the blogging, publishing Orwell’s diaries exactly 70 years from the day each entry was written.

And in the very first post, George describes catching a snake.

That snake looks like what we used to call a ‘vine snake’ and they’re harmless.  It looks to be, officially, a "Rough Green Snake" (Opheodrys aestivus).  That’s my guess based upon the area where you found it, otherwise I’d eyeball it as a Smooth Green Snake.

Here, however, is a National Geographic article about a Australian Carpet Python who has a taste for golf balls:  Python Undergoes Golf Ball-ectomy