exhausted

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This is about a snake.

Yes, a snake, so please don't go running and screaming from the room. Don't get creeped out or the heebie-geebies.

Snakes are okay. Really. They have an unique niche in the natural world.

They are like lizards except they do not have legs and you can tolerate lizards can't you?

At the nature center, we have a female black rat snake that was once an illegal pet. We acquired her through Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency.

On a recent Saturday, she surprised us by laying a clutch of 18 eggs. It took most of the day and we were amazed because she does not have a mate, which means the eggs had not been fertilized.

She stayed with her brood until she had laid the last oblong egg and then, as in nature, she moved away, presumably exhausted. This allowed Pam and Louise to remove the eggs that would never hatch.

Laid end-to-end, the 18 eggs seem to just about equal her overall body length. Oh, the labor!

How did she do it? Or, better still, why did she do it? What a waste of precious energy. Such work for no return.

For another amazing black rat snake story, visit high wire act on the farragutpress web site.