By Mary Parker Sonis
One sunny morning last April, I went eagle watching at Jordan Lake. I was inching along the shoreline at Poplar Point when I heard something loudly hissing near my feet. This was not the ordinary tail rattling of a black racer in the leaves, but a threatening loud hiss that did not abate. I looked around and discovered a beautiful hognose snake. It was about two feet long and one of the most attractively colored of these snakes: an orange-phase, boldly marked adult. I was overjoyed; I hadn’t seen a hognose snake for many years.
The first snake I ever found on my own as a child was a hognose snake. I was 4 years old, and found the young snake in a sandy pine forest near Virginia Beach. My father let me keep the snake for the day because I was so thrilled with my discovery. No Southern childhood is complete until you’ve encountered a hognose in the woods. Even James Taylor made mention of this experience in the song “Copperline.†Writing about his own Morgan Creek wanderings with his dog Hercules, he sang, “Leaning heavy on the end of the week/Hercules and a hognose snake/down on Copperline.â€
The hognose is named for the upturned snout that it uses to dig in the sandy soil and leaves in search of the toads that are its primary food source. They come in a variety of patterns and colors, from all-black melanistics to boldly marked beige/black and orange/black phases. The hognose snake is a reclusive, diurnal creature that is not commonly encountered because it spends most of its time burrowed beneath the soil and leaves. In April and May, these snakes come out to mate and you may be lucky enough to encounter one crossing the road or coiled up along a trail in the woods. You will not forget the experience.
When confronted, this snake puts on a dramatic, aggressive display. It flattens its head and spreads its neck in a wide fan, like a cobra. Sometimes people will refer to this snake as a puff adder. It inflates its body with air and hisses loudly at any aggressor. It will coil tightly and make repeated strikes at the air.
Let me remind you that the hognose is completely harmless to humans. Its strikes are done with a closed mouth, and it is extremely rare for a hognose to actually bite a human. By this time, most people are fleeing the vicinity, but the hognose has an even more spectacular display to offer.
After photographing the coiling, hissing, striking hognose snake, I leaned in and gently touched it. Almost immediately, it flipped over, writhing as if in the throes of death. It soiled itself, its mouth gaped open widely, its tongue lolled out, and fell into the sand. Lying on its back, all movement ceased, and the snake appeared dead. I picked it up and it sat limply in my hand, utterly motionless, and smelling of death. I placed it on the ground, stomach down, and, what do you know, with an imperceptible movement the wily hognose was flipped again, looking quite convincingly dead.
I stood quietly watching the snake for a few minutes, and it never moved. It was time to let it be on its way. I turned my back and walked away. After a minute, I returned, but the “dead†snake had already slithered away into the exposed roots of the shoreline trees.
Finding this hognose snake brought me back to a childhood spent wandering the woods. On those long days with very little to do with my time, I explored endlessly, and the discovery of a hognose snake was always a stellar experience. It still is.
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