We killed a small rattlesnake during our walk yesterday evening. It was flattened against the concrete of the sidewalk, absorbing the radiating heat. I stuck a camera in its face and it did nothing but flick its tongue. Normally, that would be the extent of our interaction, but because it was in our neighborhood, on a path frequented by children and pets, I did the right thing and bashed its little head with a rock. Even a baby rattler is dangerous, and we’ve already had a child in the neighborhood bitten by one.
Here’s the snake in its pre-smushed condition.
But, that’s actually not the most interesting part of our walk. While we weren’t doing battle with venomous serpents, we were watching a beautiful thunderstorm developing over Stanton and Big Spring, 20-40 miles east of us. I took a series of photos of the storm cloud.
The last three photos were obviously taken after sunset as I attempted to capture some images of lightning. I set my camera to ISO 1600 (the maximum for my Canon Digital Rebel XT), turned on the motor drive, and took almost 100 photos over the course of a minute or two. These three were the best of the batch. The first two photos of lightning were actually successive frames, taken less than a second apart. The third one was taken 10 seconds later.
Ok so..I appreciate you smooshing him. But. Um. Yeah.
The sunset was gorgeous though.
We’re having a memorial service this evening. Wanna come?
Okay, first, don’t think for a minute that a series of beautiful thunderstorm/sunset photos is going to repair the damage caused by the first image! And second, I’m curious…how do you get close enough to smoosh his head with a rock without endangering your own life?
You’re not fooling me, Gwynne. I know you’re not intimidated by a snake photo, unlike you-know-who.
As far as getting close enough to drop a rock on his head, my first impulse was just to step on him, but I didn’t want to goosh up the sole of my sandal. He never coiled, and so there was no danger. Well, very little, anyway. 😉
We commented on that cloud several times last night. I hoped you were watching too. Yea!!! We have the best sky. And we’re lucky to have you to photograph.
Thanks
Sherry
Sherry, thanks. Judging by what I saw on my Twitter feed, most of Midland/Odessa was out photographing that cloud!