Thanks for the grin

You haven't lived until you've snacked on snakes - tastes like chicken (actually chicken tastes like snake).

Typos can be so amusing. I come by the typos honestly -- I even have Type-O blood

BTW, I'm OK with snakes. I have a 6' Coachwhip snake living under my house and a few Black Racers in the yard. I had a Coral Snake come in the front door one day, but we swept it back out with a broom. It was never aggressive, but not the kind of thing you want in the house.

Unfortunately we have something much more dangerous than snakes in our yard. - - - An animal that kills more humans per year than any other animal, including other humans - - - The most deadly animal on earth - - - The one that should strike the most fear in our hearts - - - An animal that seeks you out as prey by the carbon dioxide you exhale - - - the mosquito.

You've got a higher risk of dying from a mosquito bite than a snake or even a terrorist.

That puts things in perspective for me.

Bob

Oh, yeah. Florida. Home of the growing Burmese Python population. Any of those in your backyard? Yes, mosquitoes can be deadly. I wonder what their function is in the planetary ecology? Reducing the human population could be one of them.

I'm also Type O. O neg in fact, which is the universal donor type. I try to do my duty at the Community Blood center.

I'm not especially nervous about snakes, but some family members are. When we go to the wilderness (more or less) in Canada, I try to discourage the killing of the harmless snakes we encounter there. But for some people, being surprised by a snake causes quite a panic.

Carry on!

No invasive pythons that I've seen here, but I've seen too many of them when I go out to the Everglades.

They are actually beautiful beasts.

Coyotes have migrated here, and the rabbit population has suffered. I used to have them in my yard quite often, haven't seen one in years.

On the reefs we have invasive Lionfish from the Pacific with no predators displacing a lot of the native fish.

I think both should be considered a delicacy. We humans have a habit of maning things good to eat extinct.

I'm just a couple of miles north of the Green Iguana invasion, but with climate change I suspect it will be a year or two before they get close. Their diet is mostly plants but includes bird eggs, which is not good for the local population that evolved without iguanas.

The Caribbean immigrants that live here eat the Iguanas, and call then "Chicken of the Trees" but not enough to keep their numbers down. The general population hasn't warmed up to them on their plate.

We have little Philippine and Mediterranean Geckos here that help keep the insect population in control.

I planted a lot of citronella grass and lemon grass near the entries to my house, and I rarely get a mosquito inside. Unfortunately for those 'up north' neither of these plants can be grown much north of me because a frost will kill them.

I live between a 2 mile wide brackish lagoon and a protected wetlands, so I'm lucky enough to get a lot of wildlife on my little half acre in paradise.

I donate some of my O+ blood a couple of times a year. It just feels like the right thing to do.