It was Calin vs. Wild today when he and the three other visiting grand kids spent the morning fishing and exploring the fruits of spring. He caught this lizard who seemed to take a liking to Calin and spent the better part of two hours on his shirt or his head while Calin dreamed up all kinds of reasons for keeping him. He didn't win, of course and we supervised the laid back lizard's return to the front shrubbery.
It was a sign of the seasons though. Yesterday, Kolt, our 14 year old grandson from New Mexico, went to the far side of the front pond to fish and got lucky after about 15 minutes. When he walked down to the bank to release his catch, he was startled by a gigantic Diamond Back water snake that dove into the water just a few feet from him. Kolt jumped about four feet up and back, yelling all the way. At first we were concerned it was a Cottonmouth which can be deadly. But, today Mike spotted the fat reptile on the far bank again and got his binoculars out to study it closer. Of course, this was AFTER he had loaded his 22 in case it was in fact a Cottonmouth. After 15 minutes of magnified examination compared to the descriptions and pictures online, we're 99% sure it's a Diamond Back water snake which is nonvenomous. That's the good news. The bad news is that it's so fat because it's eating our fish!
Regardless of what it is, the fishing activities have been contained to this side of the pond. But I have to say that Kolt's brief and distant encounter with ole Diamond Back has certainly
made his "what I did on spring break" story have endless possibilities.
Tonight we sat around the dinner table telling both sets of kids funny stories about their parents when they were young. One day, they'll tell their kids about the summer they spent with Sugar and Pa when Kolt literally sat down next to a huge snake commenced fishing. By that time, the snake will be Anaconda size!
I wouldn't trade these moments for anything!
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