Slytherin House

Acacia's a screamer at the best of times, but I knew when I heard the pitch of this one that something was amiss. I saw her run to the back door holding her hand and assumed she'd been stung by a bee.

"I got bitten by a snake! It's poisonous!"

Huh? There are rattlesnakes in these parts, but not in the garden. They like the hot dry dusty trails on the open mesas, so maybe in Nick's garden in Phoenix, but not here.

"What did it look like?"

"It was a gardener snake and the kids at school said they're reeeeeeeeally poisonous! I could die!!"

A garter snake? They're harmless and I've never heard of one biting so I needed to make sure that's what it was, and not a rattler.

And there it was, a fat, dopey garter, and on Acacia's hand, a queue of double dots where his fangs had lightly broken her skin in a trail along her thumb.She didn't believe me and I started doubting myself so we Googled it and they do indeed bite occasionally - but no, Acacia would not be dying from it. So off she went, climbing in the garden where the snake lay, not bothered by it and still liking snakes.

Until two days later. That was when she witnessed our fat snake wrapping itself around a small chipmunk who at the time she saw it, was already beyond saving - but still alive. She was beside herself. So sad!

The snake consumed little Chippy from the back legs up, so near the end of this ordeal, just his furry face was peeking out from the snake's dislocated jaws. Zoology 101, right by the front door, just below the empty Stellar's Jay nest.

Acacia no longer likes snakes.