#rattlesnake versus #dog and #man

Let me tell you how I fought that giant rattlesnake

     I go to work out early in the afternoon, leaving Gizmo alone for less than two hours.  After a bounding, tail-wagging, licking, energetic greeting, it is obvious that he wants to be taken out.  I let him loose in the coyote-fence protected garden, where he bounds to the farthest corner, his favorites spot for elimination.

     Suddenly, Gizmo leaps backwards, almost levitating about a foot and a half into the air.  Then he begins to bark.  Then I hear a different sound, something like a metallic rattle.

     I go to the corner of commotion, where some circular wire fencing, suitable for training and protecting tomatoes, are lying under a work bench in a tangled mess.  Could the sound be the wind moving through the fencing?  I hit one end of the nearest tomato trainers and there is that rattling sound, which now begins to sound like a rattlesnake.  Meanwhile, Gizmo is barking, loudly, frequently.

     I call Eddie LeBow, my friend and a guy who hunted and captured huge rattlesnakes as a teenager.   When he arrives, we look, poke, prod, walk both sides of the coyote fence and see no snakes at all.  We do see evidence of gophers and pack rats, which might provide food for a rather big snake.  (Eddie gives me a hoe and tells me to use it to chop off the head of the snake if it comes after me.  I complain, “I’m a tenderfoot from Chicago and San Francisco.  How do you expect me to chop off the head of a rattlesnake charging at me?”  But I agree to try.

    We find no snake, but Eddie advises us to be vigilant and not to allow Gizmo outside off leash.  Later in the afternoon,  Gizmo is OK and apparently unbitten.  I’m a little nervous for several hours.  I actually think about going to bed with a heavy shovel by my side, in case the rattlesnake attacks in the middle of the night.

“I just bought a Chihuahua. It's the dog for lazy people. You don't have to walk it. Just hold it out the window and squeeze.” Anthony Clark