IMBY.

On November 2nd, I was in my backyard when I heard a commotion next door.  My neighbor had been doing some yard work, and all of a sudden he shouted something and called for his wife.  Then I heard, "snake", and I ran over to the fence.  I looked down and there on the sidewalk next to his garage was a midland brown snake (Storeria dekayi).  I jumped the fence and caught it before it could get away, and was immediately overwhelmed by disbelief - how did this snake get here?  But before I could begin to think about that, I had to assure my neighbors that everything was okay - that these little slug- and snail-eaters are completely innocuous and are good for gardens.  They hesitated to be convinced but I think they were okay with that idea of living with a snake in their backyard.

The next day, I am out in my yard once again.  Cassius begins sniffing around the deck.  He is on to something.  His nose in stuck to the ground, his body language is telling me that there's something living under the deck.  Thinking it was going to be either a rabbit or a mouse, I looked under an inverted kiddie pool we store there.  Nothing.  Next, I flipped over an old sheet of vinyl siding leftover from when we had the siding done last year.  Resting there, all coiled up like she owned the place, was a chunky brown snake.  Two brown snakes in as many days.

So what does this mean?  In almost six years of living in this house, I've never seen a snake here, nor would I have believed that any could live here.  Did they migrate here from somewhere?  

To answer these questions, one has to really understand the brown snake.  Now, I've written about brown snakes many times here - about their grittiness, their stubbornness, their persistence.  The brown snake might be a small, nondescript little serpent, but for what they lack in aesthetics, they make up in sheer determination.  When development destroys a natural area, often, it's the brown snake that remains, making due with what little is left.  Because they are naturally found in a variety of habitats and not just one, they can easily adjust to changes in their environment.  Because they eat slugs and snails, they never have to move very far to find sustenance.  And, because they are live-bearers and produce a fairly large number of young (that are fully capable of fending for themselves from day 1), they have an upper hand at life.  Their small size helps as well, allowing them to move about without being seen in most instances.  Brown snake #2 (photos above of snake in hand) was one of the largest, if not the largest, brown snakes I've found.

The snakes did not migrate to my backyard.  At least, they didn't get here from a forest preserve or other place most people might associate with as being a place snakes live.  It's possible they could have come from someone's backyard nearby.  But, most likely, they have always been here.  They were here two hundred years ago, when the area was a pristine prairie with some patches of woodland.  Back then, they shared habitat with smooth green snakes, fox snakes, milk snakes, eastern massasauaga rattlesnakes, Kirtland's snakes, and more.  You will not find any of those around here now.  The brown snakes were here one hundred years ago, when the area was farmed.  They were here eighty or ninety years ago, when the neighborhood was subdivided.  They have dealt with the installation of sewer lines, power lines, and gas lines.  Dealt with impermeable surfaces such as roads, alleys, and patios, and the flooding that's often caused by them.  Dealt with invasive species, both directly and indirectly.  Cats, dogs, lawns, tulips, creeping charly, Japanese maples, yews, tomatoes.  Dealt with hazards such as lawnmowers, weedwhackers, grills, cars.  Not to mention Round Up, salt, motor oil, and automobile wash suds.  It is now 2015, with 2016 right around the corner, and the "lowly" brown snakes are still here, living in my backyard, eating slugs, and in all likelihood, brumating under my house's (or garage's, or neighbor's) foundation as we speak.  If that isn't enough to incite amazement, then I guess you're just not me I guess.