Tag Archives: health

SnakeS!

Posted in children, Family, Healthy Living, Homeschooling, Kids, Science, Uncategorized, Unschooling by

Plural! As in TWO snakes caught in my garden net!

First off I planted a lovely garden which clearly the wildlife enjoyed too! Because one morning I came out to water a bunch of teensy green nubs of what used to be a lovely lush green garden!

After nursing what was left, and seeing some life come back into my garden, I decided I needed to net the garden to avoid the evil plotting of the local wild life on my garden!

The net worked well. After a couple of weeks, I decided to replant a few of the spots that were clearly not going reinvent their lives and make a come back.

As I walked out to my chicken coop to feed my flock, collect eggs and water my garden (doesn’t that sound so peaceful, can you hear the morning birds chirping?) I was startled by a flicking snake tail! Thank heavens it wasn’t a rattler!

Upon closer investigation I see that TWO gopher snakes…clearly on the hunt for a yummy gopher snack, were beyond tangled up in the left over netting from my netted garden.

See the tail –>image

 

And the head –>image

 

Side note: a lot of snakes die this way and so if you have spare netting lying around, please collect it and put it up high off the ground. Gopher snakes are good friends. They will scare the s h i t out of you, because they look and can act like a rattle snake, but they are a friend and will help with gopher over population!

 

(Rattle snakes are born with at least one button on their tail and will always have a rattle, gopher snakes do not have buttons or rattles)

Here is a link to tell the difference between gopher and rattle snakes.

http://www.pe.com/articles/hayes-762525-rattlesnakes-bites.html

Scroll down to rattle snake pictures and you will find it (last picture in the set)

 

Anyhow, back to the problem at hand…what is one to do here? My husband says kill the snakes. I say no…keep the good snakes alive so the bad snakes don’t take over!

(Another side note: King snakes will kill and eat rattle snakes)

Instead we cut them out and sent them off with our local animal rescue to the vet. The vet can take the tight netting off without cutting the snake and then give it a good exam and set it back into the wild.

 

image

 

As the animal rescue woman was leaving our property another giant gopher snake was crossing our driveway…it’s amazing we still have any gophers!

And yet another side note: gopher snakes can climb trees! They will if required go looking for prey up in trees, we’ve had one flop out of a tree and land on the ground in front of my daughter…who is also an avid tree climber, so always keep a keen eye out when playing in nature, but remember gopher snakes are a friend.

alls well that ends well….two good snakes kept their lives for another day of gopher hunting.

Do You Think For Yourself?

Posted in Healthy Living by

I am realizing I’m far more opinionated than I thought, great lesson for me to learn about myself. Blogging is a fabulous platform to express ones opinions huh?

What plagues my thoughts often are how blind our society is towards all the subconscious messages bombarding our minds all day long. It’s everywhere we turn. Sports, Schools, Advertisements, Friends, Internet, etc…And how we just accept these messages without much thought, regardless if it’s in our best interest. Or the best interest of the next generation.

Example:
“Go Big or Go Hungry” (fast food catch phrase)

image

In reality it should read:
“Go Big and Get Fat, possibly die of heart disease”

But that wouldn’t sell more burgers….so a threat of hunger is their motto.

I found it particularly interesting that the person wearing this fabulous marketing tool was not small, not medium, not even slightly over weight, but rather a prime example of my reason we need to start thinking for ourselves a bit more.

According to the CDC the average sized male has increased by 20 pounds and the average sized female has increased by nearly 30 pounds in the last few decades. (This is AVERAGE sized people)

Fast food has become a staple in the last few decades.

Eating in the car on the go has become the norm in the last few decades.

Obese defined by Webster dictionary: “having excessive body fat”

Obese defined by http://www.medterms.com: “if they are more than 20 percent over their ideal weight. That ideal weight must take into account the person’s height, age, sex, and build.”

Obese defined by the National Institutes of Health (NIH): Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30 and above.

I was as guilty as the next when it came to fast food. However, we as a family have started thinking for ourselves. Now when I see “Go Big or Go Hungry” it reads “Go Big and Get Big” to me…..loud n clear….anyone else see it that way?

Let’s start a revolution to think for ourselves. Block out alllll the crazy advertising we are suffocated with each day. Be your own person. If you want to “Go Big” go for it, but do it because YOU gave it thought and its the choice YOU want.

Look for the irony in life…