Nature’s Ninja – He is NOT your friend!
Though we rarely actually see them here in Florida, Attila and I roam among a wide variety of dangerous critters – alligators, scorpions, black widows, rattlesnakes etc. But it is HE, the cottonmouth, aka water moccasin, I fear the most…. Alligators are shy and will avoid humans (unless some moron has been feeding them). I’ve been stung by scorpions, and it’s no worse than a bee sting. Black widows are reclusive, and can be avoided by not sticking your hand in dark places where it does not belong…. The rattlesnake is a reptile “samurai” – it has honor, and one can reach an accommodation with one. You hear the rattle, and if you agree not to come closer, it will agree not to bite you.
But the cottonmouth has no honor. He is camouflaged, and will strike from seemingly nowhere. He is often aggressive and territorial…. Beware that thick body, narrow neck and triangular head!
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David Churchill Barrow is a regular Liberty Island contributor and along with his wife, MaryLu Barrow, is the author of the young adult novella Silver and Lead.
About the Author
David Churchill Barrow
David Churchill Barrow is a Massachusetts “Swamp Yankee” descendant of William Bradford and Myles Standish of Pilgrim fame, who grew up on a farm that has not been sold since first built in the early 1700s. In that farmhouse still hangs the commission of James Churchill as a captain in the Massachusetts militia signed by John Hancock, and the sword of Thomas Churchill, a Navy engineer who served in the Blockade of the Confederacy. David’s father, David Bradford Barrow, was a Marine gentleman farmer who commanded a flame-thrower tank in the Battle of Saipan in WW II.
David’s childhood was mostly spent in the woods and swamps of Southeast Massachusetts, building forts and pretending to be Daniel Boone, the Little Drummer Boy of Shiloh, or just an unnamed “Minuteman” making ready to “fire the shot heard round the world.” He has lived and breathed history since first opening his eyes.
He met his wife MaryLu in high school. They were married in 1979 and have three adult children. MaryLu is a former elementary school teacher working on her first children’s book. Today they live just outside Tampa, Florida, with their Berger Blanc Suisse Attila and their two cats, Minnie and Tink.
David has written non-fiction historical pieces and columns for The Tampa Tribune (now the Tampa Bay Times), The Marine Corps Gazette and the “Lore of the Corps” section of The Marine Corps Times. He has been a regular contributor of both short stories and posts to Liberty Island Magazine since its inception. He and MaryLu co-authored Silver and Lead and are working together on a YA novel centered around the so-called “Boston Massacre.”
Comments
Hello, as a wetlands biologist and snake lover, there are a few things I would like to address with your writing on the cottonmouth. Cottonmouths are not notoriously aggressive. There are several well-documented, but unfortunately not well-known, studies on the “aggressive” behavior of cottonmouths which really emphasize that unless you harass the snake, there is little danger of them attempting to bite you. Biologists who work around them rarely (if ever) encounter an aggressive snake. I myself worked in the Everglades and cypress swamps in Florida, and cypress forests and other wetlands in Southern Illinois, encountering many cottonmouths, and getting… Read more »
Hello SwampJessMonster; Perhaps you did not notice that Liberty Island is an online literary magazine, not a herpetology forum. As a writer and frequent contributor, I often anthropomorphize animals to make a point, or merely to entertain. There is another post in this series where I accuse a sea lion named Jack of hitting on my wife. Please don’t tell me you are the type that would whine about Kipling giving cobras a bad rap in Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. As for my view of these vile serpents, it is colored by experiences such as coming to the aid of a neighbor who… Read more »