Intersnake Park

Last night we headed up to Interstate Park (for the second time in a day, BTW) for the annual Cub Scout family pic-nic.  Every year, the park invites us up and puts on a fun teaching program that often includes active games, audience participation and, one year, an excruciatingly hot hike to the highest point in the park, Eagle Peak.


This year we were treated to some time with naturalist Barb, who brought her snake Copper.

Copper is a Western Fox snake.  Fox snakes are constrictors, and Copper sure loved winding himself around Barb's arm and hand as she talked. 

We have 21 different kinds of snakes in Wisconsin, with only two of them being venomous, the timber rattlesnake, and the eastern massasauga rattlesnake. Neither of those are in my area though. Whew.  After her informative talk, Barb let the kids (and adults)  have a chance to hold or touch the snake.  Very few adults wanted anything to do with it, and only some of the kiddos were brave.  It is funny how afeard so many of us are of snakes.  Even my kids took a pass on getting too close to Copper.  Charlie did manage to put out one finger to touch him though.

Copper is right now preparing to shed his skin so he was less active than usual, and his eyes were a milky white color, which is normal for this phase.  Barb talked a bit about how snakes go about shedding their skins and passed around a large skin for the kids to experience.  William had a little more courage with that!

I had a chance to hold Copper as well, but of course I don't have a picture.  There was one Cub Scout Dad who took a pic with his phone as he commented on how he was glad I was the den leader and not him. Not a snake guy, I guess!  Maybe I'll see if he'll send me the photo so I can post it.  The snake was very calm, and was all coiled up in a knot in my hand.  I think he was quite cute!


After the snake presentation, we went for a quick hike into the nearby woods to listen to the baby Great Blue Herons. There is a rather large rookery in the south woods of the park every year and the baby GBH's make such a prehistoric creature racket!  Soaring above the trees you can catch glimpses of the parents busily flying back and forth from the nearby lake and river with food to regurgitate for their demanding young.  Here you can see three nests in the upper branches, in the middle of the photo. (click the pic to get a clearer view)

Here Charlie gives the international sign for " I am a boy with a stick.  Watch out." 

Speaking of "Watch Out", if you look closely, you'll see that the plants behind Charlie have a bit of a "whitewash" look.  That is Baby Heron Poop (scientific term). At the end of the nesting season, the park uses these whitewash markers to get a count of how many nests were in the rookery that year.   The herons will also vomit over the sides of the nests if they feel in any way threatened.  We were taking our chances hiking below those nests, for sure!

After the hike, it was time for the obligatory grilling of the hot dogs, accompanied by climbing of nearby boulders and subsequent skinned knees and stinging nettle incidents.  A fun time was had by all!  And it was so great that our event landed on the one day this week that had no rain in the forecast! Beautiful!