Snakebit!

SG | My dog yelped.

It was a quick, defeated little yelp, as all of his 15-pound frame sprang back from the overgrown bed of ivy. I was right there, sitting at the bottom of the back deck stairs with a cup of coffee as I contemplated what I might do with my day off.

He was still interested in something there in the mix of vines, weeds and pine straw, but I shooed him away. A yelp is never good. I crouched down and pushed around with my finger, searching for the offender. Then I saw it. Son of a gun.

Around this time of year in our part of North Carolina, community posts inevitably start going up with pictures of snakes in yards, crossing roads, lounging on sunny driveways, climbing walls, coiled under discarded yard toys. “What is this? Is it a copperhead?” they always ask. It could be black, brown, green, doesn’t matter. The tongue-in-cheek, unhelpful answer is always the same. “Yep, that’s copperhead!” (Unless it’s a king snake, of course, prompting admiring posts about how those noble snakes will eat your copperheads.)

I don’t know how copperheads came to reach such levels of notoriety in the North Carolina Piedmont, but I could certainly think of more worthy snakes. As a camp counselor in Alabama, I taught a nature study class and could always count on spotting scores of cottonmouths on a hike down into a swampy wetland behind our shelter. Those things are no joke — fat, mean and aggressive. Okay, I guess I can’t speak to their state of mind, but they’re definitely fat and aggressive. They chase canoes, for heaven’s sake, or so I’ve been told.

Rattlesnakes are a solid contender, and I have a good deal of rattlesnake stories that prompt shudders at the thought of what could have been. My dad had a near-miss with one on a hike and swore off ever wearing sunglasses in the woods again. A backpacking buddy of mine marched right over a hefty Timber rattlesnake coiled in the middle of the trail. I was a few minutes behind him, and it took some serious problem-solving to navigate the steep terrain off-trail to avoid the thing. When I finally caught up, he was clueless. “What took you so long?” he asked incredulously.

Well I can assure you it wasn’t a copperhead.

Copperheads are pretty, and yes, somewhat mean-looking, but I can’t say they seem very aggressive. The few I’ve come across just seem to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But as it turns out, if you happen to be a curious rat terrier exploring the yard on your owner’s day off, a copperhead lives up to its neighborhood menace status.

Because sure enough, as I foolishly probed around in those leaves, I quickly found the source of his offense: a small, coiled copperhead.

It’s a miracle it didn’t bite me, too, setting my wife up for the impossible choice of who lives and who dies. (I tried that quip on the vet and they didn’t crack a smile, meaning they’re on the dog’s side, I suppose.)

To have your dog bitten in the face by a venomous snake, off your back steps, no less, conjures a range of emotions. On the drive to the vet my mind worked to come to terms with what I thought could be our last car ride together. He was getting lethargic, his little nose beginning to swell.

He was on the vet’s table within 30 minutes of the encounter, and they assured me that of all venomous snakes, copperhead bites were relatively mild. (I knew it!) He didn’t need antivenom, just a day’s rest and a hefty blend of IV fluids and pain meds.

When I picked him up that night, the meds had delivered him to a mental state some might achieve in hour three of a Phish concert, and his face was swollen to capybara proportions. Maybe it was his sad, stumbling recovery that triggered it, or maybe it was just the vet bill, but in that moment I felt betrayed. By what, I’m not sure. My property? My lackluster dedication to weeding? I can’t fault the snake, which is no more, but which did exactly what it was wired to do in its final moments.

Our rat terrier is now back in action, with only two tiny pinprick scars on his nose to show for the ordeal. Sadly, he remains fearless (clueless?) around snakes and recently tried to befriend an antisocial green snake. Our back bed is picked clean, all ivy and weeds carefully removed to confirm he found the one and only copperhead taking up residence in that part of the yard.

So I don’t know, copperheads, did you gain any esteem in my mind as Public Enemy Number One come spring and summer? Some, perhaps. But it sure beats running from a cottonmouth.