Killbear and Snakes!

I was lucky enough to go camping this past weekend with hubby Photographer Phil. It was a perfect fall weekend, sunny and warm.

We journeyed up to Killbear Provincial Park. Usually we head over to Algonquin but I decided that we should try something different. I cheated a bit. I booked us in to a site that had electricity. After all it was the fall and I knew I would be cold so I lugged along my electric blanket and a small heater for the tent. We chuckled because we had the only tent in our campground. We were surrounded by beautiful motor homes and trailers.

Our site was really nice, considering I picked it from the web. It was surrounded by oak trees, and it was raining acorns! As soon as we got out of the car, we could hear them falling all around us. I’ve never seen so many!

The other thing I saw when I got out of the car and wandered over to the road to place our site pass on the post was what I thought at first was a large rubber snake. It was on the side of the road with part of its body in the grass. So I am walking along thinking “Gee, that was a huge snake…I wonder if it’s real…No it can’t be, it didn’t move when I almost stepped on it…hum… it must be a kid’s rubber snake…but when I turn around maybe I will find a stick to give it a poke just to be sure…”

I turned around and it stuck its tongue out at me! “Quick Photographer Phil. Get over here!”

Our “anaconda” size snake slithered around into our site, at a lazy pace and stretched right out as it slithered over towards the bush beside the site. (I checked at that point for a rattle on its tail but there wasn’t one.) At one point it picked up the pace and whipped along, disappearing into the weeds beside the creek at the back of our site. Too Cool! He had to be about 3 feet long with a small head and a rather plump body.

The next day we wandered over to the Visitor center with our cameras and showed the young gals working there our snake. They instantly recognized it as a Northern Water Snake. According to the web it is a pretty common snake to our area and completely harmless unless you are a frog.

OntarioNature. org:

“The northern watersnake can be found in and around almost any permanent body of fresh water within its range, including lakes, rivers and wetlands. Rarely far from shoreline habitats, these snakes can be found in shoreline vegetation, basking on rocks and logs, or in other open habitats along the edges of the water or under rocks along the shoreline. Northern watersnakes hibernate underground in dens or crevices, or in beaver lodges.”

The actually bear their young live and feed on fish and amphibians. They are even curious and will investigate swimmers. Wouldn’t that scare the whatever out of you!

Here are a few pictures from our trip. I wonder if I can get Glenis to go camping at Killbear?