Notes on the Blacksnake 



Helen H. Humphrey 

 Claremont, Calif. 



The blacksnake is a long slender snake with a very long tail. It 

 cannot be said to be domesticated, although I once knew a minister 

 who kept one on the hay in his bam, and always laid it to one side 

 with the pitchfork when he got hay down, and was quite provoked 

 when a new hired man killed it. He kept it to kill the mice in his 

 bam. 



The blacksnake eats birds and birds' eggs, mice and frogs or 

 other small animals which it swallows while they are still alive; it 

 has been called "an omniverous serpent." It climbs trees for 

 birds' eggs and hypnotizes its live prey. This summer I was on a 

 farm and the little eight year old boy came in very much excited 

 and said, " Grandma, there is a snake in the nest next to the setting 

 hen." The grandmother knew the ways of blacksnakes and knew 

 it would try to hypnotize the hen so that it could get under her and 

 steal the eggs. So we all went out armed to kill the thief. Two 

 nests had been made in an orange box turned on its side, placed 

 upon another box five feet high so the snake had to climb to get in 

 it. When we got there, we foimd the snake and hen both looking 

 at each other very intently around the partition between them, 

 with their heads very near together. The snake was so large that 

 it completely filled the nest as it lay coiled up within it. We killed 

 it ; in the middle of its body there was a large limip ; then we dis- 

 covered that the glass nest egg was gone ; and then we discovered 

 where it had gone — the snake had swallowed it doubtless regarding 

 it as a real egg. This proves that this snake swallows its food 

 whole with small regard for anything but appearances, and digests 

 it at leisure; if this one had swallowed all the eggs under the 

 setting hen, it could not have moved at all rapidly until it had 

 digested them, as one can easily see. One often hears the saying, 

 "I feel like a snake" after one has eaten a large meal. 



The blacksnake is usually diurnal in its habits, although it is out 

 at night sometimes. I know, because one came into our house one 

 night. One summer morning when my sister and I were small, we 

 arose late after every one else was up and working. We were in the 

 upper hall looking at a muddy skirt of mother's which was hung 



