Wendy: rattlesnake whisperer

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Traveling around the country, you meet a lot of interesting people, single-minded folks with convection. In April, I met Wendy Shaw, a passionate conservationist and self-confessed rattlesnake whisperer, i.e. protector and rescuer.

Yes, rattlesnakes. 

As her tagline states, "Rattlesnakes aren't really monsters. They just play monsters on TV." 

Wendy Shaw with night snake

This is the season in Washington state when snakes are on the move. Boy snakes looking for girl snakes, that sort of thing. 

Often at night they find themselves on darkened highways where their flattened scales do not find much traction and inevitably a car or truck comes barreling along. The thick, large scales on their bellies are called "scutes," and they are not particularly good at gripping asphalt. 

Western spadefoot toad

Let us hope that Wendy is behind the steering wheel of the oncoming car because she will kindly pull off the road and rescue the reptile (or even amphibians like spadefoots). Wendy will carry the herpetological creature out of harm's way, moving it as far from the thoroughfare as she is able. Wendy is not funded. Her mission is fueled by the goodness in her heart. She is just their sovereign protector like Wonder Woman.  

WOW 'n GOODNESS!

After a day's work, she is out until midnight or even into the wee hours, if it's a busy night, on snake patrol.

If there were a Nobel Prize for kindness, Wendy would get my nod.  

Click here and Wendy tells here own story, night patrol.  

For other posts on my trip to Yakima, click:

Yakima snake protector

Cowiche Canyon

Yakima Valley College.

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