FOCUS ON NATURE

FOCUS NATURE SNAKE AMONG THE CHOLLA

I was working in my home one warm afternoon when I heard cactus wrens making an unusual racket outside. They sounded angry. Curious, I picked up my camera and stealthily made my way to the front of the house.

The noise was coming from a cholla cactus bursting with needle-like spines where I knew a family of wrens had a nest. But I couldn't see who or what they were scolding until I crept closer. Then I saw it: a five-foot-long bull snake was slithering toward the birds' nest and the unprotected eggs within.

The wrens would light within a foot or two of the reptile, spread their wings, open their beaks, and make all sorts of noise to distract the snake. But never did they actually strike it. And the snake seemed little bothered by their antics as it maneuvered slowly through the saber-sharp spines.

Other birds soon arrived to provide support. A cardinal and a curved bill thrasher hopped around in nearby bushes but came no closer than a few feet. After about 15 minutes, they gave up and left while the wrens continued their efforts, which were becoming less and less energetic as the minutes passed.

When at last its goal had been reached, the snake stuck its head inside the nest and feasted, swallowing the tiny eggs one at a time.

Then sated, it slowly retreated.

A nest in a cholla cactus usually is safe from predators, but not from a bull snake.

Don Burgess is an ardent nature observer and a linguist-translator who has worked for the past 25 years preparing books for the Tarahumara Indians of Chihuahua, Mexico. He presently resides in Catalina, just north of Tucson.