Snakes and Red Tailed Squirrels, Oh My!

Yesterday, my son and I went hiking. We had gone almost two months without hiking, from early March until late April.

But we resumed hiking these past few weeks, and have been blessed with some sightings of incredible wildlife! Two weeks or so ago, we both saw our first bald eagle, outside of captivity!

Then yesterday, I was walking ahead of my son, when I heard him kind of gasp in surprise and back away from something. It wound up being a snake, and a biggie at that! I would estimate that this one was roughly three feet long, give or take.

Carefully, my son came along to join me on the path, giving the snake a wide berth. Later, he picked up a stick, and touched the back of the snake, and we watched it race off across the path, onto branches.

It was so fascinating, that I tried to get closer for a better look, and hopefully, more pictures. But that was when I heard rattling! Not sure if this was a rattlesnake or not, but I remembered all of those posts on Facebook, about men doing stupid things, and that being the reason that women live longer, and decided that maybe this did not qualify as the smartest things that I could be doing at this moment. So, I finally backed off!

It was pretty easily the biggest snake in the wild that I ever saw in New Jersey!

Later, we saw a red-tailed squirrel, also. It ran away when I tried taking pictures, so the quality is not nearly so good for that one.

Still, what an amazing day for a hike, and what wonders we got to see with our eyes! 

Such privilege!

Yesterday