I think we’ll be seeing more and more of it.
Roxy and were so glad to see spring return to Zion Canyon around March. We had a very nice spring. It was too short, and we didn’t see as many flowers as we have in previous years. But it was nice since we were tired of winter by that time.
It was especially nice to see the rattlesnakes and a few other reptiles return. I rescued an absolutely beautiful Great Basin Gopher Snake from the lane leading up to our house. He was stretched out right across the lane. I stopped and picked him up – I was afraid someone else had not seen him (or had seen him and didn’t care) and he was injured. But he was in perfect condition. I think he was just warming up on the black asphalt. I took him over into some tall weeds away from the road. We saw the Chuckwalla too. We didn’t see him last year at all and I was worried that he had abandoned the big crack in the rock we have named “Chuckalot” in his honor.
To begin with, it looked like the rattlesnakes had returned in the numbers I remember from a few years ago. One day, our dog Panda started going nuts at the back patio door. Sure enough, a rattlesnake had wandered into the patio and couldn’t figure out how to get out again. The rattlesnake and Panda had a good time on opposite sides of the door. Well … I’m not sure the rattlesnake was happy about it but Panda was. After the excitement died down about a half hour later, Panda started going nuts at the side patio door. A different rattlesnake had done the same thing there.
But when the heat hit, and it hit hard and long this year, things changed. Today, about a week into August, we haven’t seen a rattlesnake for a month and a half. Once they emerge from hibernation, usually around May, for almost twenty years, I have seen at least one every day all summer long.
Living a mile from the main road on the border of a national park has taught Roxy and I a few things. We believe we’re seeing the land, and the things trying to stay alive on the land, reflecting the onrush of climate change. I always believed it would happen faster than the “experts” were telling us. I never believed that it wouldn’t hit until 2050 or thereabouts as the always cautious and conservative experts proclaimed. I think what I’m seeing is that belief being turned into truth right in front of me. And, in particular, I think what I’m seeing is what biologists call Aestivation.
Wikipedia:
Aestivation (also spelled estivation in American English) is a state of animal dormancy, similar to hibernation, although taking place in the summer rather than the winter. Aestivation is characterized by inactivity and a lowered metabolic rate, that is entered in response to high temperatures and arid conditions. It takes place during times of heat and dryness, which are often the summer months.
The rattlesnakes just popped out for a quick snack of chipmunks in March and now they’re back underground again. Maybe I’ll see them again when things cool off this fall. Maybe not. We normally get some rain in the spring but we often get none at all in the fall.
I think as climate change accelerates, we’ll see more and more of this.
Addendum: 25 August 2024 ...
The rattlesnakes have returned to Kinesava, just like swallows returning to Capistrano or buzzards returning to Hinckley, Ohio. I was so worried about them. But I'm now more convinced that the hot summer due to climate change and aestivation explains the disappearance.
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