Shrill
squawks of distress interrupted our picnic-style lunch of hot dogs
and potato salad that my husband, Bill, and I were enjoying at our
kitchen table. The open windows in the room put us in the path of a
warm May breeze meandering through the house. At times the breeze
gently rustled our hair and attempted to steal our napkins with
flirtatious gusts. The air carried a pleasant smell of sweet grass
and rich earth.
“It
sounds like the birds are going crazy out there. How dare something
disrupt our lazy peaceful day. What do you think is wrong?” I
asked.
Bill
showed little interest in the commotion outside. Eating was his
priority. “How am I supposed to know? Maybe they see a hawk.
Close the window if it bothers you.”
I
got up from the table to look out the window that overlooks our back
yard and determined the squawking was coming from the apple tree
that’s only 20 yards from our house. “It’s the
robins. I think something is raiding their nest! Come on, let’s
go see what it is.”
Filled
with curiosity and excitement, I scurried out the back door with
hopes of discovering a real-life adventure! I could eat hot dogs
anytime. Bill chose not to follow.
The
apple tree, a dwarf variety stretching twelve feet tall at its
highest point, displayed a thick covering of green leaves springing
from an overabundance of sucker branches we neglected to prune off.
Small green apples bobbed from thin branches in rhythm with the
breeze. I could see the female robin flying in circles above the tree
near her nest. The male robin flew from branch to branch within the
tree while he squawked angry warnings at something I couldn’t
yet see. It looked like he was dive-bombing at a predator.
I
knew the nest was located only six feet above the ground in a fork
between two branches because I had peeked at it many times with a
long-handled mirror. Nests are usually built much higher and in a
larger tree. The outer foundation of the nest contained long coarse
grass, small twigs and coarse black tail hair from my horse. The
inside was lined with smeared mud cushioned with fine grass and soft
dog hair from my Golden Retriever. The nest was home to a lone baby
robin who had feathers, but was still too young to fly. Bill and I
didn’t know what happened to the other three babies that were
part of the same clutch. They had disappeared weeks earlier when
their feathers looked like peach fuzz.
When
I got close to the tree I screamed, “Bill, get out here!”
Bill still wasn’t motivated to leave his lunch, so I was going
to have to face this horrifying situation myself.
A
thick-bodied eastern fox snake at least four feet long was wrapped
around a large branch near the nest. The eastern
fox snake, commonly called a pine snake by the locals in my area of
Wisconsin, USA, is
a
non-venomous species of rat snake native to the upper
Midwest of the United States. They like to eat rodents and small
birds, but are harmless to humans. In the
majority of
snake breeds, females are slightly larger than the males, but male
and female eastern fox snakes can be of equal size and appearance so
I couldn’t tell which sex this one was. I assumed it was a
female only because I see lots of babies slithering around every
year.
The
head of the baby robin was in the snake’s mouth! The snake,
which I decided to name Spunky, had easily climbed our apple tree to
reach the robin’s nest. Fox snakes hang out on the ground, but
are great climbers.
At
first, I was startled by such a large snake being level with my head,
but the chilling cries of distress by the male and female robins
overcame my feelings of fear. Soon all I heard was my interpretation
of robins screaming, “Save my baby! Save my baby!”
I’m
a mother myself. Empathy for the mother robin kicked in. I was
frantic to save her baby so I ran to the back porch for my old broom
made of broomcorn attached to a long handle.
When
I returned to the tree, I hit Spunky twice behind her head with the
cornhusk end of the broom. It didn’t faze her. I hit her again.
Then I tried to push Spunky out of the tree with the broom. That
didn’t work either. Spunky appeared to be in a trance, ignorant
of my presence. I came to my senses and stopped mercilessly attacking
the poor snake.
Spunky’s
unblinking beady eyes never looked at me. She coiled herself around
the body of the little robin and tightened her grip every time the
robin exhaled. Fox snakes are constrictors and kill by suffocation. I
felt my heartbeat pounding hard in my chest as I watched the process.
Soon
the cries from the adult robins grew quieter. Less urgent. They
stopped flying in panicky circles and sat on a high tree branch to
watch from a safe distance. They made little chirping calls to their
baby, but it didn’t answer.
I
could see the baby robin was dead. My empathy started shifting. I
began looking at the situation from a new perspective. The robins
were no longer communicating with me. I began to sense the needs of
the snake.
Spunky
probably hadn’t eaten for at least a week, maybe two. She was
hungry and needed to eat in order to live. I felt guilty for hitting
her. It occurred to me that she had probably eaten the other baby
robins from this nest two or more weeks earlier when they were about
one third the size of this baby. I guessed Spunky lived under the
empty chicken coop that stood only five feet from the apple tree. I
was willing to bet some of the shed snake skins I had collected in
this area over the last few years were hers.
Spunky
still seemed oblivious to me standing so close. Usually, snakes move
to get away and hide when they see a human. I was glad she stayed
because I wanted to see how she was going to eat the robin while up
in the tree.
Slowly
Spunky loosened her coils from the robin’s body and started to
back off the branch. The baby robin was still held firmly in her
mouth as it was dragged along the bark. The snake used her tail and
lower body to coil around a branch beneath its current location. Then
she let her head and upper body drop so that she hung from the lower
branch by her tail and half of her body. The drop made her body
gently sway. She hung there resting for a moment until the swaying
stopped. All the while the robin’s head remained clutched in
her mouth.
I
stood motionless in awe only three feet away. What a beautiful snake!
Her rusty-colored head was smoothly attached to a long body that was
tan on top, accentuated with dark brown blotchy patches similar to a
venomous copper-head snake. Hanging like she was, I could see her
yellow belly checkered with irregular black squares. Her tail was
thin and pointed. Judging by the brilliant color of her skin, I
guessed she had recently shed an old skin.
Spunky
loosened her coils that held her to the branch and she dropped a few
inches. She loosened some more and dropped another inch or two. She
continued to slowly loosen the coils so that more and more of her
hung from the branch. I could see her grip getting smaller and
smaller. Her head was still about eight inches off the ground, but
her body was too heavy to hold onto the branch with just her tail, so
she let herself completely drop to the ground.
I
expected her to slither away and eat the robin in hiding, but that
didn’t happen. Spunky was on a survival mission and she needed
the grass to help finish it. Slowly, meticulously, she dragged the
robin by its head backwards through the grass. As I watched in
fascination and joy for the experience, I saw how Spunky was using
the grass to draw the robin’s wings in close to its body. The
process straightened all the feathers and would make it easier for
her to swallow the robin. Eventually, Spunky stopped dragging her
prey and took a minute to rest. Her round beady eyes never blinked
during the whole process. Snakes don’t have eyelids.
So
far, I had been watching Spunky for about sixty-five minutes. Then,
with a yawning-like movement, her lower jaw dislocated from the upper
jaw. I watched as the baby robin slowly moved deeper and deeper into
the mouth of the snake. Spunky would pull back a few inches to
straighten a wing feather, then move forward to push the robin a
little deeper into her mouth. This see-saw action took another
thirty minutes before the tiny feet of the baby robin disappeared
completely.
Finally,
Spunky started to slowly move away. A huge bulge stretched her
expandable elastic skin where her body joined her head, hindering her
ability to make a fast exit. I watched her slowly slither into a hole
beneath the concrete wall of the nearby chicken coop. She needed a
safe haven to digest her meal.
It
was a privilege and learning experience for me to watch this amazing
exhibit put on by Mother Nature. Hopefully, it taught the robins to
build their nest higher in a taller tree.
Laura
Steidl is the leader and contact person for a local writers’
group. She lives in rural Weyauwega, Wisconsin in the United States
of America with her husband of 60 years, and a Kentucky Mountain
Saddle Horse. She enjoys writing memoirs and short stories for
children as much as she enjoys horseback riding. Laura considers
herself to be a perpetual student of life.
